De la saleté a la poésie : portrait de la France périphérique dans l’Été des charognes de Simon Johannin

Simon Johannin's debut novel, "L'Été des charognes," published in 2017, offers a vivid portrayal of life in La Fourrière, an isolated village located in the Vosges. This area falls within what the French sociologist Christophe Guilluy terms 'France périphérique,' which refers to rural regions plagued by poverty and a sense of neglect. Through the perspective of an adolescent narrator, Johannin depicts the village's harsh daily reality, emphasizing its pervasive violence and the filth that characterizes its landscape. The narrative is saturated with descriptions of unpleasant odors, particularly from the decomposing carcasses of farm animals awaiting disposal, which permeate the village and underscore its marginalization. My study aims to highlight how Johannin valorizes often disparaged aspects of the French rural landscape. Rather than softening the harsh realities of these neglected spaces, Johannin transforms them into an aesthetic gesture. Unlike Édouard Louis's sociopolitical approach in "The End of Eddy," Johannin uses a literary and aesthetic lens, focusing on the sensory experience of reading. This study explores how Johannin's approach transcends the abject aspects of "peripheral France" by integrating them into a literary framework, thereby challenging conventional discourses on these marginalized areas. By creating a sensory, olfactory landscape, Johannin establishes a depiction for La Fourrière, making its overlooked realities visible and significant. This process can be likened to an alchemy, echoing Baudelaire's poetic transformation of "boue" into "or." Ultimately, this study seeks to examine the symbolic significance of Johannin's representation of peripheral France, particularly through its most abject elements, and to reflect on the poetic possibilities of filth and the role of literature in transforming the abject into an object of aesthetic interest.