Esthétique du régionalisme

Abstract

Despite its considerable volume of production and extensive readership, regionalist literature is created within a process of discredit, of exclusion from literary histories and even of disdain for its lack of universalising ambition and its role in the creation of stereotypes. This article examines what characterises the aesthetics of this marginalised genre in terms of both narratology and the aesthetics of deviation, or shift in tone. The hypothesis developed here, which allows us to interpret this literature from a new angle, puts forward the concept of the disparate regionalist striving to regenerate the dullness of ‘great’ literature by injecting it with new lifeblood.

Keywords

• regionalism
• aesthetics
• Cladel (Léon)
• Sand (George)
• literature