Revue semestrielle de linguistique et littératures romanes

Écho des études romanes 2017, 13(2):215-225 | DOI: 10.32725/eer.2017.032

Les identités simulées et dissimulées d’Opal Whiteley. Les tropes français dans La Rivière au bord de l’eau. Journal d’une enfant d’ailleursFrench

Damian MAS£OWSKI
Université Nicolas Copernic, Toruñ

Mots clés: Opal Whiteley; identité française; La Rivière au bord de l’eau

Opal Whiteley's simulated and dissimulated identities. French tropes in La Rivière au bord de l'eau. Journal d’une enfant d’ailleurs

In 2006, by dint of the release of the French translation of The Story Of Opal: The Journal Of An Understanding Heart (La Rivière au bord de l'eau. Journal d'une enfant d'ailleurs), Opal Whiteley was introduced to French readers. Born in 1897 in Colton, in Washington, Oregon, she chose a particular avenue of escapism, the invention of a new personality: the lost daughter of Prince Henri of Orléans (1867-1901). This kind of dissimulation of identity means the rejection of her family of lumberjacks together with their unremarkable entourage. Such an attitude stems from her childish imagination as well as from various dissociative disorders.
In the present paper we submit The Story Of Opal and the biography of the famous Oregonian to analysis. Therein, we will try to find the fountainhead of her fascination towards the historical and cultural heritage of France that affected her life, her discourse and her works. As a result, it is extremely interesting to see and understand Opal Whiteley's tendency to the French pen-names and aliases. She was, inter alia: Françoise d'Orlá, Marie de Bourbon, Francesca Henriette Marguerite d'Orléans or Françoise Marie de Bourbon-Orléans. Nevertheless, the simulated origin of the author has never been definitely established by critics. The age at which Whiteley wrote her "journal" is also disputable. She claimed that she was six years old at the moment of finishing her manuscript (published in 1920). However, researchers have accused her of having faked the whole story as well as having concealed her true age for marketing reasons. The genuine origin and the true identity of Opal Whiteley instigate, without a shadow of a doubt, numerous polemics. Only the genius and the imagination of this child prodigy has never been subjected to any controversy.

Keywords: Opal Whiteley; French identity; The Singing Creek Where the Willows Grow

Published: December 11, 2017  Show citation

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MAS£OWSKI, D. (2017). Les identités simulées et dissimulées d’Opal Whiteley. Les tropes français dans La Rivière au bord de l’eau. Journal d’une enfant d’ailleurs. Écho des études romanes, 13(2), 215-225. doi: 10.32725/eer.2017.032
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