Inspired by the work of their colleague David Gascoigne, a group of scholars from the UK and France examine in this book the narrative strategies of some of the most interesting and important French writers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Stretching chronologically from 1905 to 2005, the volume examines a wide variety of prose genres, from pornography to Bildungsroman to magic realism, as well as poetry. Michel Tournier figures in several of the contributions, emerging as something of a touchstone for many of the thematic preoccupations that are common throughout the period: values and authority, self and other, identity, spirituality, migration and exile, sexuality, the body, violence and war, and language. The authors also examine the flourishing of intertextuality, as well as the use of traditional forms, such as mythical structures and the 'robinsonade', to undermine authoritative 'metarecits'. Probing these themes and forms, and their metamorphoses across 100 years, the essays demonstrate a striking degree of continuity, linking writers as different as Apollinaire and Houellebecq or Valery and Fleutiaux, and highlight the difficulty of dividing the period neatly into chronologically ordered categories labelled 'modern' or 'postmodern'.

First published in 1997, this volume examines the presidential elections, one of the central events of the democratic process in France, and arguably the main organising principle of French politics since 1962, provide an opportunity to assess the development of the regime. More significantly, they allow us to asses modifications to the office of president and to French Presidentialism which are both reflected in an affected by the electoral campaign and the elections themselves. This book provides such an assessment, with specific reference to the candidates, issues and events of the 1995 Presidential elections.

First published in 1997, this volume examines the presidential elections, one of the central events of the democratic process in France, and arguably the main organising principle of French politics since 1962, provide an opportunity to assess the development of the regime. More significantly, they allow us to asses modifications to the office of president and to French Presidentialism which are both reflected in an affected by the electoral campaign and the elections themselves. This book provides such an assessment, with specific reference to the candidates, issues and events of the 1995 Presidential elections.