Orthodox Spirituality and the Boundaries of Europe in the Novels of Maria Maïlat and Liliana Lazar

This article analyzes comparatively Sainte Perpétuité (1998) and Terre des affranchis (2009), by Romanian-French authors Maria Maïlat and Liliana Lazar, as texts that reflect on the cultural place of Romania in present-day Europe through the theme of spirituality. Their vivid portraits of Orthodox religion, which contrast with French secularism, and the exotic place of the Balkans in the French cultural imaginary largely explain their favorable reception. Yet, when read in light of their formal aesthetics—ambivalence, circumlocution, metonymy, irony, and trace—these novels complicate neat East-West divisions, thus proving to be more than exotic fictions designed for easy consumption.