92

The article analyzes both the forms of control of literary production by the Tunisian authoritarian regime and the forms of arrangements, resistance and indifference the Tunisian writers have developed towards the political interference into their writings. The empirical material is composed of sixty interviews with editors and writers publishing in Arabic or French, enriched by testimonies and a corpus of twenty creative writings (co)published in Tunisia. The article attempts to explain the writers’ literary visions by the reconstruction of their socializing experiences and by their dispositions. Thus, social origins, political and literary socializations, and occupations throw light on the diversity of these visions. Some of the writers with deep political dispositions and who experienced censorship have been involved in the collective defense of literary autonomy. Writers publishing in Arabic, coming from poor classes and who are journalists, whether they have had or not an activist experience, often define literary autonomy as a transgression of the social and political taboos. Writers issued from culturally privileged classes, who are teachers or scholars, and who have not experienced an activist engagement seem to emphasize literature as an expression of individuality and as an aesthetic work.