Né en 1935 à Estérençuby (Pyrénées Atlantiques), Eñaut Etxamendi est écrivain, poète et chanteur en langue basque. Dans son œuvre narrative, il décrit la société agraire du Pays Basque Nord – concrètement, la province de la Basse-Navarre – et son processus de désagrégation sociale et culturelle à partir des années 60. Quelle place accorder dans la littérature basque moderne à cette œuvre, qui sublime l'idylle détruite ? Quelle est sa place et son originalité au vu des productions des auteurs basques contemporains? Quelle part de l’œuvre d’Etxamendi se situe sous l’influence de la pensée nationaliste et quel peut bien être son degré de participation à la construction de mythes identitaires? Nous utilisons les concepts du formalisme russe pour décrire la structure, le matériau littéraire et le dynamisme de l'œuvre etxamendienne. Puis, nous interrogeons ces résultats par l'apport du post-formalisme et des propositions bakhtiniennes et tâchons de situer l'œuvre littéraire d'Eñaut Etxamendi dans son rapport à l'idylle détruite et au Cкaз. Finalement, nous faisons intervenir l'ethnocritique de la littérature et le post-colonialisme, afin d'inscrire l'œuvre littéraire d'Eñaut Etxamendi dans « la mémoire longue d’une communauté discursive » et dans le contexte particulier des années 1960-1990 qui alliait la vitalité politique à la vitalité culturelle. L’objectif de ce questionnement est d’approfondir dans la connaissance de l’œuvre d’un auteur mais aussi d’une région littéraire du Pays Basque encore trop peu étudiées. / Eñaut Etxamendi was born in Esterençuby (Pyrénées Atlantiques, France), in 1935. He is a writer, poet an singer in basque language. In his literary work, Eñaut Etxamendi describes the agrarian society who was disappearing by the 60's in the North Basque Country – concretely in the province of Basse-Navarre – and the process of social and cultural disbanding that occured then.Where can be placed Eñaut Etxamendi's literary writing – sprung up in geographical and linguistic periphery – and its sublimated « idyllic chronotope » in basque modern literature ? Which is his originality comparing to other contemporary basque writer's works ? What is Etxamendi's part of work under nationalist theories's influence and up to which point has his literature pertained to the discourse of identity ? Our search is an attempt to improve knowledge of a few known author and few known literary area of Basque Country.

The aim of this study is to draw new perspectives to the theoretic approach towards the complex nature of the modern fairy tale genre and its transformation. The study is exemplified by two books by Alan A. Milne about Winnie-the-Pooh (1926-1928), Tove Jansson’s eight books about the Moomintrolls (1945-1970) and Eno Raud’s four books about three funny creatures called “Nakstitrallid” in Estonian (1972-1982). In this thesis, I examine the disputable problem of defining the fairy tale genre in modern literature and refer to the history of the genre and storytelling tradition that have indirectly inspired all three authors in their decision to turn for fairy tale as a genre. Applying the poetical analysis, I argue that these authors contributed to the continuity of fairy tales by creating the link between folkloric heritage, novelistic literary expression and children’s imagination. This study can therefore be considered as topological, however it does not pretend to introduce the complete systematic definition of the genre as the thesis’ format does not allow such in-depth investigation. In the first chapter, ‘Archaic world stimulation in modern fairy tale’, I examine the dominating literary categories that refer to the folk fairy tale intertext: Bakhtin’s concept of ‘chronotope’ – category of time and space, system of fictional allegoric characters and category of fantastic.  In the second chapter, ‘Modern fairy tales from perspective of children’s literature’, I analyze the books of Milne, Jansson and Raud in the scope of narratological and aesthetic categories of children’s literature. The folkloric laughter intertextually reproduced by naïvism of the Moomins, the Naksitralls, and Winnie-the-Pooh’s friends, while folkloric collective hero is presented by universal harmony of a happy family and child-like protagonists. I came to the conclusion that poetics of folklore fairy tale still exists in these books through the intertextual dialogue. Modernism as literary method re-evaluates folkloric aspects such as nonlinear time, the blurred boarders between individual and cosmos, material and spirit, text and reality. Every new artistically unique fairy tale world resembles the new stage of the genre development. The more innovative is the story, the more sophisticated can be its poetics.