Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"

In the final scene of Michel Tournier’s postcolonial novel La Goutte d’or (1986), the protagonist, Idriss, shatters the glass of a Cristobal & Co. storefront window while operating a jackhammer in the working-class Parisian neighbourhood on the Rue de la Goutte d’or. Glass fragments fly everywhe...

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Main Author: Richard J. II Gray
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Lodz University Press 2012-12-01
Series:Text Matters
Online Access:https://czasopisma.uni.lodz.pl/textmatters/article/view/6931
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spelling doaj-38fb41cc6ee1441cb8f37603818dbeee2020-11-25T02:55:06ZengLodz University PressText Matters2083-29312084-574X2012-12-01225026310.2478/v10231-012-0068-16931Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"Richard J. II Gray0Denison UniversityIn the final scene of Michel Tournier’s postcolonial novel La Goutte d’or (1986), the protagonist, Idriss, shatters the glass of a Cristobal & Co. storefront window while operating a jackhammer in the working-class Parisian neighbourhood on the Rue de la Goutte d’or. Glass fragments fly everywhere as the Parisian police arrive. In La Goutte d’or, Tournier explores the identity construction of Idriss through a discussion of the role that visual images play in the development of a twentieth-century consciousness of the “Other.” At the beginning of the novel, a French tourist takes a photograph of Idriss during her visit to the Sahara. The boy’s quest to reclaim his stolen image leads him from the Sahara to Marseille, and finally to the Rue de la Goutte d’or in Paris. The Rue de la Goutte d’or remains one the most cosmopolitan neighbourhoods of the city. In Tournier’s novel, the goutte d’or also corresponds to a symbolic object: a Berber jewel. It is the jewel that Idriss brings with him, but which he also subsequently loses upon his arrival in Marseille. From the very moment that the French tourist photographs him, a marginalization of Idriss’s identity occurs. Marginality, quite literally, refers to the spatial property of a location in which something is situated. Figuratively speaking, marginality suggests something that is on the edges or at the outer limits of social acceptability. In this essay, I explore the construction of the marginalized postcolonial self (the “Other”) through an examination of the function of visual representation in the development of a postcolonial identity in La Goutte d’or. In the end, I conclude that the construction of a postcolonial identity is based upon fragmentation and marginalization, which ultimately leads its subject to create an identity based upon false constructions.https://czasopisma.uni.lodz.pl/textmatters/article/view/6931
collection DOAJ
language English
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Richard J. II Gray
spellingShingle Richard J. II Gray
Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
Text Matters
author_facet Richard J. II Gray
author_sort Richard J. II Gray
title Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
title_short Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
title_full Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
title_fullStr Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
title_full_unstemmed Beyond the Margins: Identity Fragmentation in Visual Representation in Michel Tournier’s "La Goutte d’or"
title_sort beyond the margins: identity fragmentation in visual representation in michel tournier’s "la goutte d’or"
publisher Lodz University Press
series Text Matters
issn 2083-2931
2084-574X
publishDate 2012-12-01
description In the final scene of Michel Tournier’s postcolonial novel La Goutte d’or (1986), the protagonist, Idriss, shatters the glass of a Cristobal & Co. storefront window while operating a jackhammer in the working-class Parisian neighbourhood on the Rue de la Goutte d’or. Glass fragments fly everywhere as the Parisian police arrive. In La Goutte d’or, Tournier explores the identity construction of Idriss through a discussion of the role that visual images play in the development of a twentieth-century consciousness of the “Other.” At the beginning of the novel, a French tourist takes a photograph of Idriss during her visit to the Sahara. The boy’s quest to reclaim his stolen image leads him from the Sahara to Marseille, and finally to the Rue de la Goutte d’or in Paris. The Rue de la Goutte d’or remains one the most cosmopolitan neighbourhoods of the city. In Tournier’s novel, the goutte d’or also corresponds to a symbolic object: a Berber jewel. It is the jewel that Idriss brings with him, but which he also subsequently loses upon his arrival in Marseille. From the very moment that the French tourist photographs him, a marginalization of Idriss’s identity occurs. Marginality, quite literally, refers to the spatial property of a location in which something is situated. Figuratively speaking, marginality suggests something that is on the edges or at the outer limits of social acceptability. In this essay, I explore the construction of the marginalized postcolonial self (the “Other”) through an examination of the function of visual representation in the development of a postcolonial identity in La Goutte d’or. In the end, I conclude that the construction of a postcolonial identity is based upon fragmentation and marginalization, which ultimately leads its subject to create an identity based upon false constructions.
url https://czasopisma.uni.lodz.pl/textmatters/article/view/6931
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