In considering the most prevalent voices that figure in critical discussion of postcolonial literary production in the French-speaking Americas, one cannot help but notice the overwhelming presence of works by writer-intellectuals from France's overseas department of Martinique. While this phenomenon might be explained, to a certain extent, by the simple fact of the island nation's incorporation into the French state and consequent visibility with respect to Euro-North American academics and publishers, I would argue that there is something more subtle at play here as well. Specifically, it would seem that there exists an important correlation between the fact of the physical journey to Paris embarked upon by Martinique's most prominent writers and the production of an explicit, self-defining theoretical perspective—a perspective that effectively generates the principal intellectual frame within which the works of these writers can be read. In other words, by providing explicit interpretive foundations for their literary production, certain Martinican writers have effectively demanded scholarly engagement with their work; they have situated themselves physically and discursively with respect to the metropolitan center, and so have opened the door to a transatlantic dialogue dedicated to the theorization of their own aesthetic creations.

Given this very rewarding interaction between historical metropolitan center and (post)colonial periphery, it is crucial to think about the consequences of ex-centricity—of not-Paris—for francophone writers of the Americas. Taking as my point of departure the notion that critical appreciation of writers in the French-speaking Caribbean is meaningfully connected to a given author's theoretical training in France, I consider what happens to those writers—like Frankétienne, Fignolé, and Philoctète—who choose or are obliged to remain physically anchored in the space of their island. What are the consequences for those who refuse the voyage to Paris along with certain of the theory-centric underpinnings of literature this voyage implies? Further, in what ways might franco-theory-centric approaches be deployed in analyzing New World literature in French without abstracting or de-specifying regional or local traditions? These are the questions that interest me here.