L’ambivalence du récit de guerre : Mugi to heitai de Hino Ashihei, de l’expérience individuelle au récit commun

Abstract

Hino Ashihei’s first war novel, Mugi to Heitai, is both an individual account and the narrative of a shared experience. Written as a diary, the text relies on its author’s own authority as a soldier to assert its authenticity; however, there is more to the soldier’s voice – especially when this soldier is writing a literary text – than one may expect. Hino does not always speak for himself; his voice can also be read as that of a spokesperson who speaks for the other soldiers, confident that they all share the same war experience, literally offering them a stage to narrate their own war stories. Studying Mugi to Heitai’s many voices thus highlights the process by which Hino ultimately manages to define and maintain his own text’s value despite its paradoxical stance.

Keywords

• War Literature
• Documentary Literature
• Polyphony
• Diary
• Propaganda