Les fous en marche. La figure du fou dans le roman d’Afrique noire d’après les Indépendances

Abstract

The massive presence of fools in the narrative of Black Africa from the colonial era up to and beyond independence, leads us to question the writing strategies of contemporary African authors. This cross-sectional and diachronic study on the implementation of the madman in francophone novels, from 1947 to 2009 (namely from Birago Diop’s "Sarzan" to Boubacar Boris Diop’s Les petits de la guenon, through the works of six more novelists), aims to shed light on the critical value of its function in literature. Beyond the anthropological and historical implications that typify the fool in the colonial era, the madman plays an increasingly crucial role in the past decades, not only as a theme or character, but first and foremost as a code and discursive function. The madman thereby becomes a figure of mediation and protest in the social and religious fields, as well as in the political and literary institution, where he catalyses the novelists’ critical discourse.