Cet ouvrage de C. Chivas-Baron explore la présence et l'influence des femmes dans l'empire, de l'Ancien Régime au XXe siècle, tout en examinant leur rôle aux colonies. Il constitue une ressource précieuse sur le genre et la colonisation. Il inclut également des contes et légendes d'Indochine.
The book explores the complex relationships that Victor Segalen, André Malraux, Marguerite Duras, and Roland Barthes had with Eastern cultures, stemming from their dissatisfaction with modern European values. Each author's unique background influenced their interactions with (post)colonial ideologies, revealing both complicity and resistance. Through an "off-center" reading of their Eastern texts, the work challenges simplistic postcolonial binaries, offering a nuanced understanding of the authors' ambiguous constructions of the Orient.