Abstracts Womens Studies

Figures féminines et féministes dans la poésie de Chloé Savoie-Bernard (2015-2021)

by Marie-Pierre Houle

In 2021, the Anthologie de la poésie actuelle des femmes au Québec (2021) confirms a hovering intuition: women's poetry is experiencing a meteoric rise in Quebec (Bell and Cormier-Larose, 7). Moreover, as the Gaspar report demonstrates, contemporary women’s poetry rapidly diversifies and includes a plurality of voices (Bell & Cormier- Larose, 2021, 12-13). Among these voices is that of Chloé Savoie-Bernard, who, in her first three collections of poetry, puts forward rebellious, sovereign, and militant female and feminist figures. While, according to Marie-Andrée Bergeron, Chloé Savoie-Bernard is "already one of the most remarkable feminist literary voices of her generation", current scientific research is limited due to the contemporary nature of the work (2019, 38). This thesis therefore focuses on the first three collections of poetry by the Québécois author: Royaume scotch tape (2015), Fastes (2018) and Sainte Chloé de l'amour (2021). The poet brings forth female and feminist figures who embody the spirit of the feminist killjoy as theorized by Sara Ahmed in Living a Feminist Life (2017). The study, divided into three chapters corresponding to the three collections, highlights the particularities of female and feminist figures (often killjoys) through time. They first deconstruct the (fairy)tales that shape and assert identity from childhood while questioning the legacies and heritage they inherit, whether it is that of family, literature, or feminism. Then, they highlight the violence of a patriarchal, heteronormative, and oppressive society that shapes their relationship to their body. They go so far as to use the metaphor of cannibalism to think of the male gaze. They are even killjoys in feminist circles, denouncing “woke-washing” and tokenism. Finally, sisterhood appears as an ideal towards which the author tends, in each collection, as feminist killjoys struggle individually and side-by-side.