Transgression de l’espace et espace de la transgression dans The Human Stain de Philip Roth
Coleman Silk’s most striking—geographical, social and cultural—transgression comes from his decision to depart from New Jersey’s low-middle-class (black) districts to settle down in the cosy, right-thinking and compartmentalized (white) environment of a Massachusetts university. But the hero only su...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Presses Universitaires du Midi
2006-06-01
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| Series: | Anglophonia |
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| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/acs/2450 |
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| Summary: | Coleman Silk’s most striking—geographical, social and cultural—transgression comes from his decision to depart from New Jersey’s low-middle-class (black) districts to settle down in the cosy, right-thinking and compartmentalized (white) environment of a Massachusetts university. But the hero only succeeds this social and cultural ascent by knowingly and, at one point, methodically rejecting his black origins. Obviously, Coleman was meant to transgress. However his betrayal catches up to him: in the middle of the political correctness of the late 1990s, this scholar, who teaches Latin and Greek, sees his entire universe turn upside down after he clumsily calls two repeatedly-absent black students spooks. He is then disavowed and banned from the university community. Reading The Human Stain, one is forced to question what is generally considered as being evil and to become aware of the extreme difficulty and yet unavoidable necessity to transgress the space of the supposed common good which locks the notions up within themselves to freeze conscious thinking and behavior. |
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| ISSN: | 1278-3331 2427-0466 |