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Articles

Volume 28, Number 1 (2007)

De French Town au Testament du couturier: la critique face à elle-même

Submitted
February 20, 2009
Published
2007-01-01

Abstract

Minority literatures, such as Franco-Ontarian literature, have often been read and analyzed from the identity perspective as it relates to the socio-cultural context from which it originates. As a result, aesthetics and formal considerations were generally neglected by both critics and interpreters. Such was the case with Michel Ouellette’s early work particularly his play French Town. However, in the mid 1990’s, several critics and theoreticians, specializing in minority writings, have questioned this simplistic perspective, thus advocating a more literary approach. Hence, this article aims to verify the extent at which critics have truly abandoned their traditional method of reading minority literatures. In order to do so, the authors propose an analysis of the critical reception of French Town—between 1993 and 2003—and Le testament du couturier—produced and published 10 years later. Résumé Les littératures minoritaires, telle la littérature franco-ontarienne, sont souvent lues et interprétées en fonction d’une grille de lecture identitaire qui établit une corrélation entre l’œuvre lue et le contexte socioculturel d’où elle émane. Ce fut le cas des premières œuvres de Michel Ouellette, dont sa pièce French Town. Or, certains théoriciens et critiques des écritures minoritaires ont dénoncé cet état de fait. Cet article cherche à déterminer si la critique a effectivement délaissé une telle grille de lecture. Pour ce faire, les auteures analysent et comparent la réception critique de French Town à celle du Testament du couturier.