Deterritorializations in the Feminine in the Novel by Chahdortt Djavann or How to Put One’s Exile Beyond Borders?

Abstract

The purpose of this contribution is to define the reasons why the main narrator of Chahdortt Djavann, in her novel Je nesuis pas celleque je suis [I Am Not Who I Am] (2011), chooses to leave her country of origin, Iran, to go into exile in France. The novel draws on the real experience of the author herself, who, like her narrator, arrives in France at the age of 27 and speaks no words in French. In what follows, we will try to show that exile as a form of deterritorialization can also be a choice, even a necessity, a vital need. In this vein, the problematic of the ontological, geographic and cultural gap is highlighted and concretely reflected, in the novel, by the personal situation of the author herself.