Mohamed Leftah : le corps dans l’ordre poétique

The article proposes a reading of the body in the work of Moroccan novelist Mohamed Leftah (1946-2008). The reading is built around three axes: the body as a locus of signification, the corporeal imaginary as encoded in Leftah’s naturalism, and finally the status of the body within the contemporary political framework. Through Leftah’s use of eros, violence and body art, and relying on the work of Peter Brooks, Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari and Alfred Gell, the article makes a case for the sublation of the corporeal into the poetic as being an urgent political and ethical task.