L’usage romanesque de l’Histoire dans Léon l’Africain d’Amin Maalouf
Fictional Use of History in Leo the African by Amin Maalouf

Summary/Abstract: While fiction is literature based on a writer’s imagination, non-fiction is literature based on facts. Meant and supposed to convey the truth, biographies and autobiographies are considered factual narratives.Still, despite the obvious disparities between them, all historical and fictional narratives recount events, which makes them versions of the same type of discourse. The main character in Amin Maalouf ’s Leo the African is a real person, Joannes Leo Africanus, who lived back in an era that we can only know (more or less extensively) through documents. Unlike historians, who are keenlyi nterested in discovering and communicating the truth, Amin Maalouf mostly relies upon his imagination in order to deliver the story of his protagonist of choice. Although, now and then, he may pretend to be a historian (in his own way), the novelist is not really interested in rigorous fact-checking and he does not feel compelled to stick with the factual truth. Never hesitating to move away from History to totally embrace fiction, Amin Maalouf strongly asserts himself as a novelist, not a historian.

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