Quem tem medo dos Franceses?

• Main Author: Maria de Fátima Marinho
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Association Portugaise d'Etudes Françaises 2012-06-01
• Series: Carnets
• Subjects: French influence; Historical novel; identity; Instability
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/carnets/7314

This essay, meaningfully polemic, equates the ambiguous relationship, both seductive and controversial, which was established, from early days, between Portuguese culture and its French counterpart. To a more dependent attitude, typical of the 19th century, the existence of a common cultural space follows, perhaps European or western, which will translate into analogue structures. The feeling of belonging loses its momentum, i. e., a sense of common needs, instable identities and recurring pasts now rules. And, in both literatures,, we find similar processes of questioning the present through a past in progress.