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Madness And The Middle Passage: Warner-Vierya's Juletane As A Paradigm For Writing Caribbean Women's Identities, Ann Elizabeth Willey

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

This article links Glissant's theory of an inherent Caribbean madness due to the originary rupture and alienation from Africa with Foucault's theory of the ritual significance and essential liminality of the madman as exemplified in the medieval figure of the "Ship of Fools." In calling the madman the "passenger par excellence," Foucault implies a connection between sanity and linear narratives, such as that of a voyage. Myriam Warner-Vierya's novel, Juletane, suggests that European paradigms of narrative and voyage are inadequate to provide a sense of self for Caribbean women. The novel takes the form of a diary that chronicles …