Return Native Land

Autonomy and Self-Definition in Cesaire's Notebook of a Return to the Native Land

The concept of selfhood is one of the most complex and essential elements in Aimee Cesaire's book-length poem Notebook of a Return to the Native Land. There is a constant dialogue -- often an argument -- between the external and internal elements that attempt to define and control the identity of the speaker. At times, there is even a marked consciousness in the speaker's resolve to deny external influences (Cesaire). Even here, though the very refusal speaks of a certain acknowledge influence. Furthermore, the fantasies of autonomy, or at least freedom from the immediate external influence that the speaker perceives, are themselves dominated by large-scale external forces. After dismissing a cop in his immediate reality, the speaker reflects on his own fragility in respect to the Earth and "its grandiose future -- / the...
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