Approaches to Teaching Duras's Ourika

Informationen zum Autor Mary Ellen Birkett is professor of French studies at Smith College. Her publications touch on Desbordes-Valmore, Fontenelle, Hugo, Lamartine, Nodier, Rousseau, Sainte-Beuve, Sand, Senancour, Stendhal, and Vigny. She is coeditor of Religious Tolerance and Intolerance in Ancient and Modern Worlds and author of Lamartine and the Poetics of Landscape . Christopher Rivers is professor of French at Mount Holyoke College. He is the editor and translator of My Life and Battles , a memoir by Jack Johnson, and Mademoiselle Giraud, ma femme and the author of Face Value: Physiognomical Thought and the Legible Body in Marivaux, Lavater, Balzac, Gautier, and Zola . Klappentext When it was first published! in 1823! Claire de Duras's novel "Ourika" became a best seller almost immediately! and in recent decades! instructors have found it an irresistible addition to their syllabi. But from a teacher's perspective the novel presents something of a paradox. It is short! its narrative structure is uncomplicated! its vocabulary is limited! its plot is straightforward. It thus lends itself to "simple" readings that fail to reveal the novel's rich fund of social and historical themes. Set against the backdrop of the French and Haitian revolutions! the Terror! and the restoration and featuring the first black woman narrator in French literature! "Ourika" raises issues of identity! inequality! exclusion! power! and race and gender relations. The goal of this Approaches volume is to help teachers bring out the novel's profound and complex underpinnings and reveal "Ourika!" its Senegalese protagonist! as a victim of history and a timeless tragic heroine.

Product details

• Authors: Mary Ellen (EDT) Birkett
• Assisted by: Mary Ellen Birkett (Editor), Christopher Rivers (Editor)
• Publisher: Modern Language Assn Of Amer
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 30.03.2009
• EAN: 9781603290197
• ISBN: 978-1-60329-019-7
• Series: Approaches to Teaching World L; Approaches to Teaching World Literature; Approaches to Teaching World Literature 107; Approaches to Teaching World L; Approaches to Teaching World Literature 107
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Education > School education, didactics, methodology; Social sciences, law, business > Sociology > Sociological theories