Wake Of The Other-the Construction Of Identities In Aimé Césaire's Cahier D'un Retour Au Pays Natal

Aimé Césaire,a poet,playwright and political leader from Martinique,is one of the initiators and proponents of the Negritude Movement.Among the first to ponder over the colonial issue,which is later called "post-colonialism",Césaire's thoughts have inspired many postcolonial precursors,especially Frantz Fanon.Cahier d'un retour au pays natal(Notebook of a Return to My Native Land),Césaire's first major work,autobiographically records the exploration of the young poet to break the shackles of colonial culture and to search for new identities.His subversive writing style,combining the features of both European modern poetry and African culture,has created brand new aesthetic and artistic values.This work,serving as the basis of Césaire's literary creations,has become one of the francophone poetic canons of the twentieth century.Therefore,the analysis of this masterpiece plays a crucial role in understanding the source of Césaire's philosophical ideas,the concept of "Negritude"and the theoretical foundation of post-colonialism.The considerable research on Notebook on an international scale has achieved fruitful results in aspects of imagery and style.However,the analysis of the identity primarily focuses on the theme of Negritude,or "Black writing",instead of exploring the diversity and complexity of identities built in the Notebook.Therefore,this thesis aims to show the rich potentiality of reconstructing identities at multiple levels in a colonial context.Following the logic of "departure-return-new departure" in Notebook,the thesis is divided into three chapters:The first chapter presents the identity crisis of Césaire in Martinique,which drives the poet away from his native island.The description of Martinique unveils that the collusion between the colonial economy and the cultural assimilation policy reduces Martinique people to the states of inertia,cowardice and servility.However,the poet's tone of criticism also betrays his ambiguous attitude:unable to identify the Island as homeland,the poet loses the sense of belonging and isolates "uthe Self" from Martinique and from Martinicans.The second chapter explains how Césaire revolts against the colonial discourse to rebuild new identities through the spiritual,socio-cultural and poetic returns.The first return is the spiritual return,which initiates the reconstruction of individual identity of the poet."I" in the Notebook go through a series of metamorphoses and gradually transformed from the failed "Savior" to an ordinary"man".According to Anthony Giddens's theory of self-identity,these transformations told by the poet can be considered as retrospective and self-reflective narration.It puts the poet under the double gazes of the White and the Black,and reveals the psychological alienation of the author.This process allows Césaire to reconcile with the black community and to actively engage himself in the struggle against colonialism with identity derived from the reflective narration.The second return is the socio-cultural return that enables the reconstruction of collective identity.Through a structuralist analysis of the text,this thesis connects the major units of imagery in Notebook in order to rebuild its spatial structure.The connection shows how the poet,by juxtaposing the empire-centered narration and the Martinique experience,questions the authenticity and legitimacy of this official narration and reveals the objectification of the peripheral Other.Meanwhile,by the image of "blood",the poet binds the Martinicans to their geographic and racial roots,praises the characteristics and cultures of the black people,and eventually draws a promising prospect of future where people of different ethnic grroups coexist and communicate in harmony as well as preserve their own singularities.The third return is the poetic return that presents the poetic innovations in Notebook.There are three kinds of them:the poet's cooperation with Surrealism in order to rebel against the French literary tradition,his appropriation of French by the corporation of foreign language,especially the Creole,and his combination of rhythms of French poetry with African drumming.All three methods have enabled Césaire' s poetic language to express the complex reality of Martinique and to get back the voice of the silent peripheral Other.The third chapter summarizes the characteristics,limitations and potentialities of this reconstruction.On the one hand,the poet puts forward the concept of Negritude.Fanon's psychoanalysis is applied to demonstrate that Césaire's "self-analysis" and his doubt on the legitimacy of the official narration have jointly destroyed the origin and the symptoms of the inferiority complex.Although the concept of Negritude is still at risk of a simplistic dichotomy,it consummates the formation of exclusive specificities of the Black and stimulates the awakening of black consciousness.On the other,the Notebook devotes itself to the establishment of a Martinican space,owing to its attention to Martinique's history,its representation of natural and cultural environments of the island,and its reputation as the father of Martinican literature.Thus,this work makes this tropical island the homeland.In conclusion,the Notebook reconnects the Martinique to its racial root,fights against the alienating effect of colonial discourse by the concept of Negritude,and tries to rebuild the pride of Martinicans.Although the identity of a single race doesn't necessarily fit the ethnic diversity of Martinique,the Notebook makes also possible the construction of a Martinican identity.It shows a series of awakening of the Other:the poet who is alienated,the black who are objectified and the Martinique Island that is marginalized.Each of them tries to break the cultural shackles in order to find their new identities.The poetic work evokes continually the tension between singularity and universality,challenges the universality from perspective of the Other and creates a space of differences through the writing.In the era of cultural cross-fertilization,this tension is highly valuable in building the identity of each and every individual.