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- Title
Reimagining the Swallow and the Toad: Narrating Identity and Reconciliation in Postgenocide Rwanda.
- Authors
Applegate, Elizabeth
- Abstract
Le passé devant soi by Gilbert Gatore (1981-- ) is one of the only novels about the 1994 Tutsi genocide by a Rwandan writer. Published in 2008, the novel attracted notice because of the nationality of its author and because of its portrayal of the relationship between killer and victim, which some have considered unrealistic and even unethical. The criticism that the novel has garnered in some circles raises questions about how genocide should be memorialized and represented through fiction. Though the novel may not accurately portray the psychology of killer and victim, it evokes the role of storytelling in the construction of identity and raises questions about the possibility of reconciliation. In this way, Le passé devant soi reflects the history of ethnic stereotypes that prepared the Tutsi genocide and draws attention to the complexity of reconciliation in Rwanda today.
- Subjects
RWANDA; LE passe devant soi (Book); GATORE, Gilbert; RWANDAN literature (French); RWANDAN Civil War, 1994; RWANDAN history; TUTSI (African people); CRIME victims; GENOCIDE in literature
- Publication
Research in African Literatures, 2012, Vol 43, Issue 1, p70
- ISSN
0034-5210
- Publication type
Literary Criticism
- DOI
10.2979/reseafrilite.43.1.70