A peripheral intellectual in Paris

trauma and creation in Une Mélancolie Arabe, by Abdellah Taïa

Abstract

The relationships between trauma, melancholy and artistic creation, in the autofiction Une Mélancolie Arabe (2008), by Abdellah Taïa, are the background for the cinematographic and literary initiation of the protagonist, Abdellah, a Moroccan living in Paris. The purpose of this article is to show that this narrator-character, from a peripheral country, when experiencing the mourning of his origin and the cultural idealization of the host country, problematizes a relevant issue for comparative literature, debating, during return trips to countries Arabs, the idealization of the French capital as a reference for intellectual training. The hypothesis put forward is that, when experiencing initiatory rituals, in which artistic work and social and erotic interactions intertwine, the narrator finds himself confronted with the imaginary frustration embodied by the body and language of the other, ending up reinventing his place as a francophone writer. The theoretical-methodological contribution consists of the concepts of melancholy, by Sigmund Freud; não-lugar da literatura, by Eneida Souza; différance, by Jacques Derrida; ethical violence, by Judith Butler; and minor language, by Deleuze and Guattari.