Cover; Table of Contents; Introduction: for a Francophonie of cohabitation; I. France at the gates of Cathay; Macau and Canton: the first European fringes; The intrinsic links between China and Indochina; The ramifications of the French presence; II. The affirmation of the French presence in Asia; 'Paris of the East'; Guangzhouwan: the colonies' colony; Modes of colonization in Asia; III. French offshoots: the case of China; Genesis of the first Francophones in Asia; Francophone manifestations; The gestations of a literature of cohabitation; IV. The birth of a literature of cohabitation

Colonial literature vs. literature of cohabitationPastiches of French masterpieces; Literatures of French expression; V. France-Asia crossings: the case of the French corpus; A literature of the intimate nourished by the East; The oriental 'self' in Loti and Claudel; The Oriental fortune of Comment Wang-Fô fut sauvé; Conclusion: towards a Francophonie of cohabitation; Selective Bibliography; Index

This book offers a pioneering study of Asian cultures that officially escaped from French colonisation but nonetheless were steeped in French civilisation in the colonial era and had heavily French-influenced, largely francophone literatures. It raises a number of provocative questions, including whether colonisation is the ultimate requirement for a culture's being defined as francophone, or how to think about francophone literatures that emerge from Asian nations that were historically free from French domination. The ultimate result is a redefining of the Asian francophone heritage according to new, transnational paradigms.

Open Access EbpS