Ethnic Cartographies of London in Bernardine Evaristo and Zadie Smith

Abstract

Territory stands out as one of the major constituting elements of national identity, and it has been remarkably so in the twentieth century. One need only remember Rupert Brooke's famous sonnet 5, whose initial argument ('If I should die, think only this of me:/ That there's some corner of a foreign field/ That is forever England') established an intimate connection between self and soil, individual and nation'. Similarly, after examining the lack of status of English women in society Virginia Woolf concluded that they had very little to thank England for, and that they could not lay claim to any nation at all as long as they remained generally deprived of property, jobs, and other citizen rights^. George Orwell looked into the character of his nation too. His famous essay 'England Your England' denounced his countrymen's insularity and xenophobia, marvelling that after spending four years in France during the Great War, 'they did not even acquire a liking for wine'^.Post-Second World War developments (especially the related phenomena of de-colonisation and immigration), as Roger Bromley suggests, have 'helped to pull "Englishness" out of shape, and to push it in new directions, clearly differentiated formations"*. A brief survey of recent fiction releases might show a range new approaches vying for public attention. Kazuo Ishiguro's celebrated The Remains of the Day (1989) surely pioneered the Correspondence: Pilar Cuder-Dominguez, Dpto. Filologia Inglesa, Campus del Carmen pabell6n 11, Universidad de Hueiva, Hueiva 21071 (Spain), phone: +34/(0)959/019-139, fax: +34/(0)959/019-143,