ÉCRITURE ET IMAGINAIRE : POÉTIQUE DE L’IDENTITÉ DANS L’ŒUVRE DE NINA BOURAOUI

Abstract

This work examines the connection between identity and writing in Nina Bouraoui’s

entire body of work, which spans a period of twenty-seven years (1991-2018) and is

composed of sixteen novels, both fictional and autobiographical. I specifically look at

the ways in which the author’s mixed heritage – Algerian father and French mother –

informs her work and fuels her quest for identity in a world that constantly challenges

her sense of self, shaping the way in which she recreates a place to negotiate the

internal tensions through her writings. Drawing on theoretical discourses on cultural

hybridity, I proceed to an analysis of the author’s writing processes, including her

own reflections on cultural in-betweenness; her reliance on metaphors connected to

the body as a “palimpseste” and nature as a refuge; the role of historical memory in

the construction of the self; and her need to transcend binary paradigms to create her

own history as a woman and her own story as a writer.