Modes of transport and rhythms of mobility in Bernard B. Dadié’s Un Nègre à Paris (1959) and Tété-Michel Kpomassie’s L’Africain du Groenland (1981)

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article discusses Bernard B. Dadié’s Un Nègre à Paris (1959; 1994) and Tété-Michel Kpomassie’s L’Africain du Groenland ([1981] (2015); 2001) by focusing on their portrayals of transport and rhythms of mobility, and in so doing enhances the dialogue between travel writing studies and mobilities research. The texts’ representations of mobility practices and the rhythms thereof contribute to the production of the traveller figure (tourist; Arctic adventurer) and the destination (colonial metropolis; Arctic periphery). Dadié’s portrayals of transport produce a poetics of mobility that conveys a sense of speed and hurry but also of not being in the rhythm of the colonial metropolis, which eventually transforms into a critical attitude towards assimilationist impulses. Kpomassie’s travelogue captures the idea of an unreachable destination and the traveller’s struggle to pursue the journey despite obstacles, but also attests to the productive qualities of inertia as well as to the eurythmy of Arctic mobilities.