Nicole Brossard Criticism
Nicole Brossard is a foundational figure in Québécois literature, renowned for her avant-garde and experimental approach that has substantially influenced the landscape of French Canadian women's writing. Her work is characterized by radical feminist and lesbian themes that challenge patriarchal norms, as seen in discussions of her poetic politics in Poetic Politics. Brossard's literary journey, which began in Montreal where she was born in 1943, reflects the evolution of her poetic voice, with early influences from semiotic theorists like Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida, as noted by Karen Gould.
Brossard co-founded the avant-garde journal La Barre du Jour and the feminist magazine Les Têtes de Pioche, contributing significantly to dialogues on gender and language. Her narrative works, such as Un livre and Le Désert mauve, blend prose and poetry, eschewing traditional plot structures to explore themes of liberation and lesbian desire. Mauve Desert, praised by Irving Malin, examines perception and reality, while other works delve into the intricate relationship between sexuality and language, as discussed in Patriarchal Mothers: Nicole Brossard.
Despite some criticism for her non-traditional narrative methods, Brossard has been acclaimed for her poetic and radical voice, which has expanded her influence beyond literature into broader feminist intellectual discourses. Her interviews, including Nicole Brossard: ‘Before I became a feminist, I suppose I was an angel, a poet, a revolutionary…’, highlight her role in redefining women's voices in literature.
Her international reputation as a leading feminist theorist is underpinned by works like L'Amèr and Amantes, which address issues of gender and sexuality with linguistic innovation, celebrated for subverting patriarchal norms. In Picture Theory, influenced by Wittgenstein's theories and discussed in an interview, Brossard continues to creatively explore these themes. Her work, although intellectually challenging and sometimes perceived as elitist, is praised by critics like Louise H. Forsyth for its role in making women's voices prominent in Quebec literature.
Contents
- Principal Works
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Brossard, Nicole (Vol. 115)
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Subversion Is the Order of the Day
(summary)
In the following essay, Bayard compares Brossard's earlier work to her later writing, tracing her growth as a writer.
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Interview with Nicole Brossard on Picture Theory
(summary)
In the following interview, Brossard examines the intricate themes of her novel Picture Theory, emphasizing the influence of Wittgenstein's language theories, intertextuality, and the concept of the hologram to explore the portrayal of women and the synthesis of her literary oeuvre.
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The Development of a Lesbian Sensibility in the Work of Jovette Marchessault and Nicole Brossard
(summary)
In the following essay, Rosenfeld compares the 'great contributions [of Nicole Brossard and Jovette Marchessault] to the development of a lesbian sensibility in the literature of Quebec.'
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Women of Skin and Thought
(summary)
In the following review, Andersen discusses the feminist aims of Brossard's French Kiss and Lovhers. Nicole Brossard is one of the leading writers of Quebec. From a feminist literary viewpoint she is probably the most important one: she is an innovative writer who is also a radical feminist. Questioning established cultural patterns and systems, her texts—prose, poetry, theory and often a mélange of the three—have since the seventies been showing Quebec writers the way to modernity. Brossard's writing is literary theory as well as political statement; it promotes and uses almost exclusively women's images, symbols, language and experiences. Her aim is to place woman in the center—of society, culture and politics.
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Feminism and Postmodernism
(summary)
In the following review, Godard discusses Nicole Brossard's Le Désert mauve and Gail Scott's Heroine and asserts that "It will be hard for [other writers] to surpass the brilliance of the writing of Gail Scott and Nicole Brossard in their critiques of representation and of narrative."
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A review of Lovhers and Le Désert mauve
(summary)
In the following review, Forsyth states that in Brossard's Lovhers and Le Désert mauve she "writes with the assumption that both the personal and the poetic are political."
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i, a mother / i am other: L'Amèr and the Matter of Mater
(summary)
In the following essay, Bok asserts that in Brossard's L'Amèr, she "disarms phallogocentric language, disarms such words as 'mother' and 'woman' and 'figure' so that they can no longer be used as masculine weapons."
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Modernity and Lesbian Identity in the Later Works of Nicole Brossard
(summary)
In the following essay, Rosenfeld discusses Brossard's Amantes and Picture Theory to show that "Nicole Brossard's postmodernism is linked inextricably to her lesbian-feminist vision of the world."
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The Enigma of Writing
(summary)
In the following review, Parker argues that Brassard's Picture Theory and Mauve Desert are fine samples of how Brossard integrates the language of current scientific theories and technological advances into an intuitive, utopian vision of a more just future for women, lesbians, and other marginalized groups.
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An Interview with Nicole Brossard: Montreal, October 1993
(summary)
In the following interview, Brossard and Huffer explore Brossard's intertwining of feminism and fiction, emphasizing her belief that fiction is a space where women challenge patriarchal narratives and construct new realities through language, desire, and the metaphorical "hologram" as a synthesis of identity and cultural critique.
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Producing Visibility for Lesbians: Nicole Brossard's Quantum Poetics
(summary)
In the following essay, Godard discusses Brossard's use of quantum theory in her discussion of visualization and lesbian politics in Picture Theory.
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From Lesbos to Montreal: Nicole Brossard's Urban Fictions
(summary)
In the following essay, Huffer asserts that Brossard's oeuvre distinguishes itself from an entire Sapphic tradition of lesbian writing by demystifying nostalgia rather than celebrating it.
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Region/Body: In? Of? And? Or? (Alter/Native) Separatism in the Politics of Nicole Brossard
(summary)
In the following essay, Verwaayen discusses the role of separatism in the politics set forth by Brossard in her writing, tracing how the patriarchal impetus of the Quebec separatist movement circumscribes feminist aims and suggesting the incompatibility of feminist and Quebec nationalism as discursive constructions.
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Subversion Is the Order of the Day
(summary)
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Brossard, Nicole (Vol. 169)
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Poetic Politics
(summary)
In the following essay, Brossard outlines her views on writing, desire, language, and reality, considering the political element of each.
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Nicole Brossard: Beyond Modernity or Writing in the Third Dimension
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Gould evaluates Brossard's poetry volumes Suite logique and Le Centre blanc, and particularly her novel Un livre, as key texts in the formulation of a new, experimental literary modernity in Quebec.
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Installations
(summary)
In the following review, Bishop offers a positive assessment of Installations, calling the work 'a joy.'
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Mauve Desert
(summary)
In the following review, Malin comments favorably on Brossard's “subversive, otherworldly” novel Mauve Desert, admiring its play with perception, language, and reality.
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Nicole Brossard: ‘Before I became a feminist, I suppose I was an angel, a poet, a revolutionary. …’
(summary)
In the following interview, Brossard and Williamson explore Nicole Brossard's feminist consciousness, emphasizing her literary transgressive acts, the intertwining of motherhood and lesbianism in shaping her feminist identity, and her critique of societal norms through innovative narrative forms and language, which challenge traditional patriarchal structures and promote a reimagined urban and literary landscape.
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Review of Baroque d'aube
(summary)
In the following review, Green discusses the plot and thematic content of Brossard's novel Baroque d'aube, noting its glorification of women and dismissive depiction of male characters.
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Patriarchal Mothers: Nicole Brossard
(summary)
In the following interview, Brossard and Daurio explore Brossard's feminist theory of writing, her influences, and the evolution of her literary style, emphasizing her efforts to challenge patriarchal narratives and create new visions through a blend of emotion, theory, and linguistic innovation, particularly in works like Mauve Desert.
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Nothing Sacred: Nicole Brossard's Baroque at Dawn at the Limits of Lesbian Feminist Discourses of Sexuality
(summary)
In the following essay, Moyes examines how Baroque at Dawn uses the baroque genre to “explore new vocabularies and new discourses of lesbian sexuality.”
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Text: In Which the Reader Sees a Hologram in Her Mind's Eye
(summary)
In the following essay, Knutson studies Brossard's feminist vision of woman as it is symbolized by a three-dimensional, holographic image in her novel Picture Theory.
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Delirium and Desire in Nicole Brossard's Le Désert mauve/Mauve Desert
(summary)
In the following essay, Holbrook explores the suggestive relationships among reading, writing, translation, interpretation, and desire illustrated in Brossard's novel Mauve Desert.
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Poetic Politics
(summary)
- Further Reading