The putrid blood of colonialism: Élie Stephenson’s unpublished play

Tradução da apresentação do volume STEPHENSON, Élie. L’œuvre inédite d’Élie Stephenson (1974-1990). Paris: Karthala, 2018.

Abstract

Élie Stephenson, born in Cayenne in 1944, is one of the great Guyanese writers of our time. He published books of the most different genres, producing a work marked by an explicitly political lyricism. In her dramatic work, this trait is revealed through an engaged writing, concerned with the problems arising from the complex relationship between the Guyanese territory, its people and France. This text is a translation of the presentation of Stephenson's unpublished theater plays, published in 2018, written by the critic and professor of Francophone literature Biringanine Ndagano. Author of several books and articles, in his preface, Ndagano addresses different traits of Stephenson's theater, drawing attention, however, to the engaged nature of his work. For this, the critic seeks to put the plays in the volume in question in dialogue with others that had already been published previously, building a kind of guide to all who want to start in the author's theater.