Abjection, Derision and Power: Writing in the Voice of the Victim in Three French Post-War Texts

• Published in: Law, culture and the humanities Vol. 18; no. 3; pp. 557 - 575
• Main Author: Atack, Margaret
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.10.2022; Sage Publications Ltd
• Subjects: Autofiction; Narratives; Rhetoric; Rhetorical figures; Sartre, Jean-Paul (1905-1980); Stereotypes; War; Holocaust; abjection; Serge Gainsbourg; Second World War France; perpetrator; victim; derision; Romain Gary; Albert Cohen

Alongside the well-known narratives of the mode rétro, which returned in the 1970s to the years of war and Occupation in France, there were texts that challenged simplistic notions of guilt and innocence through a virtuoso deployment of sarcasm and derision. Romain Gary’s La Danse de Gengis Cohn (19...