Dossier Laméca
Fonds romans Laméca
un guide de lecture en 16 auteurs caribéens
« He really wasn’t happy hearing his children cursing him. It wasn’t a good sign. He knew they had a heavy load to carry; but when a people begin to curse their elders, the next step they take is to curse their gods. He loved his children. It was their living that would make him an ancestor. His wisdom was theirs to have; but they had eaten salt and made themselves too heavy to fly. So, because now their future would be in the islands, he preferred not to place temptation in their way by revealing to them the mysteries of the flight. »
Salt, p. 3
Présentation de l’auteur
De Trinidad & Tobago, l’incontournable Earl Lovelace a produit une œuvre à forte résonance dans la Caraïbe anglophone et bien au-delà, particulièrement entre les années 1970 et 1990. Le talentueux auteur a vu le jour en 1935 dans la ville de Toco à Trinidad & Tobago. D’abord élevé par ses grands-parents à Tobago, il rejoint ses parents à l’âge de onze ans dans la capitale à Port of Spain. Sa connaissance profonde des régions et communautés du pays lui permettra de se nourrir de récits populaires diversifiés et d’apprécier les différents modes de narration, ainsi que les idiomes. Earl Lovelace a exercé en tant que journaliste, avant de devenir romancier, dramaturge. En parallèle, il a enseigné plus de trente ans dans la Caraïbe et aux Etats-Unis.
Présentation de l’œuvre
Sensible à l’évolution de la société trinidadienne post-indépendance, Earl Lovelace dépeint dans son œuvre les étapes concurrentielles qui ont abouti à l’avènement du modernisme au détriment des traditions culturelles. Le carnaval en constitue un exemple édifiant avec des bouleversements de rites, de costumes, de musique, de hiérarchie, de programmation, etc., même si çà et là, des substrats symboliques demeurent. Dans les romans de Lovelace, il semble qu’aucun pan de cette société ne soit sortie indemne de la mutation précipitée vers la fin du vingtième siècle. C’est ce dont il est question dans The schoolmaster, Salt, The dragon can’t dance ou encore The wine of astonishment avec étroitement entremêlée l’emprise politique sur la nouvelle structuration sociale. Lovelace se focalise ainsi sur les luttes menées par ses personnages contre le délitement de leur identité et le maintien de leurs traditions. Il opère un travail singulier entre la langue anglaise et les différentes langues vernaculaires de Trinidad & Tobago tenant compte des régions, des milieux sociaux-professionnels, des communautés d’origine de ses personnages principaux ou secondaires.
Une tradition orale forte
Ayant une connaissance approfondie de différentes régions de Trinidad & Tobago et Tobago, Earl Lovelace a utilisé la richesse linguistique de son pays pour retranscrire les régionalismes des différentes composantes de l’île. Ainsi, les marqueurs énonciatifs recèlent les subtilités des idiomes et correspondent à une perception du monde unique. Les narrateurs ne s’expriment jamais en anglais standard : « You is the expert, but he believe that he know better than you what is you want him to do, and he do it and he mess it up. » (Salt, 7). Ce passage démontre en effet que le narrateur privilégie la syntaxe populaire et ne conjugue pas les verbes à la troisième personne du singulier. L’auteur n’hésite d’ailleurs pas à souligner le caractère incongru des personnages jugés pédants pour leur mimétisme langagier. « He spoke with a lot of superior smiling, in a self-important, put-on tone, his words barely intelligible, his talk weighed down with words he could not pronounce and phrases he did not understand. » (“The fire eater’s journey”, A brief conversion and other stories, 35). En restituant à chaque personnage ou groupe son idiome, Earl Lovelace dévoile un parti pris en faveur de la valorisation de la culture nationale, laquelle traduit avec plus de justesse le rapport au monde qu’entretiennent les trinidadiens.
Combattre le non-sens de valeurs aliénantes
Modernisme ou mutation ne s’apparentent pas forcément au progrès chez Earl Lovelace. Ce constat est essaimé dans nombre de ses œuvres à l’instar de The Schoolmaster. Au cœur des préoccupations d’un petit village, les habitants se convainquent de la nécessité de l’implantation d’une école, tout en craignant la puissance de son potentiel clivant. En effet, pragmatiquement, le temps consacré aux études de leur progéniture ne peut se soustraire aux travaux de la ferme. D’autre part, les valeurs promues par l’école seront-elles en adéquation avec celles de la cohésion et la survie de la communauté ou n’encourageront-elles pas l’exode de leur jeunesse ? L’extrait suivant reflète les atermoiements d’un prélat préalablement à la réalisation du projet : « And Father Vincent felt a twinge of sadness in his heart, and he wished that he did not have such a man to deal with, because maybe the school should not be built in Kumaca, maybe it would not be good for the villagers. » (The Schoolmaster, 24). Dans le même ordre d’idées, l’auteur fustige certaines mœurs qui précipitent les valeurs culturelles de l’île. Sans refuser que la modernité n’intègre la société trinidadienne, l’attachement prononcé pour certaines traditions représente un marqueur identitaire essentiel chargé de sens pour le peuple. A ce titre, Aldrick Prospect, héros de dimension tragique, dans The Dragon can’t dance, polarise toutes les tensions entre son rôle de garant d’une tradition artistique du carnaval par lequel il tire sa renommée ; et l’avalanche de doutes qui l’assaillent sur la pérennité et le bien-fondé de ces rites :
« And I is a dragon. And what is a man? What is you or me, Philo? And I here playing a dragon, playing a masquerade every year, and I forget what I playing it for, what I trying to say. I forget, Philo. Is like nobody remember what life is, and who we fighting and what we fighting for…» (The dragon can't dance, 124).
A l’échelle du pays ou à l’échelle d’individus condamnés à lutter et à s’adapter, l’œuvre d’Earl Lovelace pose les défis d’une société en transition dans la période post-coloniale.
Mots clés
Trinidad & Tobago • Carnaval • Enfance • Religion • Musique • Caraïbe • Histoire • Post-Colonialisme • Colonialisme • Ruralité • Multiculturalisme • Tradition • Identité • Rébellion • Transgression • Engagement • Acculturation • Matérialisme • Mutation • Communauté • Littérature orale • Conte • Nouvelles
Bibliographie sélective
- While gods are falling, London, Collins, 1965.
- The schoolmaster, London, Collins, 1968.
- The dragon can't dance, London, André Deutsch, 1979.
- The wine of astonishment, Oxford, Heinemann, Caribbean Writers Series, 1983.
- Salt, London, Faber & Faber, 1996.
- A brief conversion and other stories, Oxford, Heinemann, 1988.
Pour aller plus loin
Extraits
‘It’s these games you boys play? This haircut is the whole cause.’ I was glad that I had escaped a flogging. I was ready to rush off.
‘And those clothes, ‘ she said sternly. ‘You will please wash them yourself”.
‘Yes, Ma, ’ happy that this was to be the price of my reprieve. “And that head. You better get one of your friends to cut your hair. Fitzie does trim too clean.’
‘Yes, Ma,’ Thank you, Ma.’ I wanted to hug her. It was in my eyes.
‘Boy,’ she said looking down at me. ‘What wrong with you now?’
I wanted to hug her, to say, ‘I love you’.
‘Nothing’, I smiled. With us love had always been expressed in language more tender and tough than words.
“A brief conversion”, A brief conversion and other stories, p. 30
Faithfully, every year, a few days before Carnival Monday, the fellars of the neighborhood would come to his room to see his costume as he was putting the finishing touches on it; and he would send for a bottle of rum, and they would all sit down and talk, Philo, Sammy and Rio and fellars from Mr Alphonso shoemaker shop. They would sit down and talk about old times - Carnival, dragons - and soon somebody would start singing a calypso, and others would join in, and somebody would start to beat bottle and spoon, and one of the men, not Aldrick, would begin to do a dragon dance, and all the people from the Yard - Miss Olive and Caroline and Cleothilda too would come out to watch, one of the fellars would say ‘ Aldrick, let us see you dance the dragon, ’ and he would say, ‘No. You can’t see me dance that dance; that is a secret.’
The dragon can't dance, p. 120
No. Let me tell you anyway. You see me here, I is thirty-one years old. Never had a regular job in my life or a wife or nutten. I ain’t own a house or car or radio or racehorse or store. I don’t own thing in this fucking place, except that dragon there, and the dragon ain’t even mine. It just come out of me like a child who ain’t really his father own or his mother own… They killing people in this place, Philo. Little girls, they have them whoring. And I is a dragon. And what is a man? What is you or me, Philo? And I here playing a dragon, playing a masquerade every year, and I forget what I playing it for, what I trying to say. I forget, Philo. Is like nobody remember what life is, and who we fighting and what we fighting for...
The dragon can't dance, p. 124
‘No, this ain’t no joke. This is warriors going to battle. This is the guts of the people, their blood; this is the self of the people that they screaming out they possess, that they scrimp and save and whore and work and thief to drag out of the hard rockstone and dirt to show the world they is people’. He felt: ‘This is people taller than cathedrals; this is people more beautiful than avenues with trees.’ And full to brimming with furious tears, Aldrick felt again then fierce love and hope that he had doubted in himself, felt again a sense of mission; felt that yes, there was a place here for him, that there was something to say yes to, and people before whom and on whose behalf he could dance the dragon.
The dragon can't dance, p. 137
And I wish Bee would tell something about the battles that we fight already, about things that a boy Taffy age can’t know. I wish Bee would just say something so the boy would know what to do. But Bee there walking with his head straight and his eyes in front of him as if he want the boy to keep up his vexation, as if deep inside his heart he want the boy to turn rebellious even if it mean going against him too. I look at Bee, but Bee have his eyes straight and his jaw bulge down with that stiff, steady, hurting walk of a man bearing a funeral coffin, his body stiffening as if he prepare to take the blame, to be a nothing in his own child eyes. And I... I ain’t saying nothing, leaving Taffy question to hang in the air.
The wine of astonishment, p. 72
The tall, lean man stood a moment watching the priest. And Father Vincent felt a twinge of sadness in his heart, and he wished that he did not have such a man to deal with, because maybe the school should not be built in Kumaca, maybe it would not be good for the villagers. But how do you tell this to such a man? If he must say no, then he must have his no backed by the force of reason before which this man must bow. And maybe he would have to say no.
The schoolmaster, p. 24
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SOMMAIRE
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par Dr Ayelevi Novivor
© Médiathèque Caraïbe / Conseil Départemental de la Guadeloupe, 2017-2018