Identité et espace chez André Brink: Looking on Darkness, Rumours of Rain et Imaginings of Sand

Abstract : This article explores André Brink's conception of identity in terms of space. Examining three novels which all revolve around a first-person narrator exploring his/her own identity, Looking on Darkness, Rumours of Rain and Imaginings of Sand, it shows that Brink's conception of identity is both spatial and familial: characters try to become "rooted" in South African soil, but this rooting process is achieved only in the post-apartheid novel, Imaginings of Sand. A brief comparison with Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon tries to shed light on the source of Brink's spatial conception of identity.