La littrature mauricienne et les dbuts de la critique

Jean-Louis Joubert used to say that Mauritian literature has been around for a very long time, but remains in the shadows. The same can be said about the local critical discourse that emerged alongside Mauritian literature from its beginnings. The colonization of Mauritius in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was initially characterized by the absence of literature given that its inhabitants were struggling to clear and sow the land. In the nineteenth century, the colonial elites began to feel the need to enlighten the populace, to bring about a sense of belonging and to do so through the establishment of a literary heritage that would be recognized by the motherland (France) and by the other islands of the Indian Ocean. This patriotic objective was taken up by the first literary journals supported by literary groups which produced the journals. Those journals have played a predominant role in the rapid growth of Mauritian literature and its literary criticism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This local critical discourse, mainly by author-journalists, shows two trends: francotropisme and mauricianisme. It also played a major role in giving Mauritian literature its distinct identity.