If you’ve ever taken a course in French literature, you probably had to read at least one work by a Francophone author with African origins. France’s colonial empire once controlled a significant portion of Africa, and while nearly all of these areas gained independence by 1960, French is widely spoken in many African nations. For better or for worse, France remains tightly connected to its former territories, and many French people seek to broaden cultural ties as well as improve their understanding of colonial history.
While Africa is often viewed as homogeneously backwards and impoverished, such notions are woefully uninformed. Among its diverse riches is a thriving community of writers who combine their mastery of expression with poignant tales of identity. These authors don’t just produce bestsellers that satisfy French people’s need for atonement. Their works regularly appear in the hallowed ranks of literary prize winners.
I love reading books that transport me to unfamiliar settings, books that are geographically, culturally, or historically remote from my own experience. My favorites combine this attribute with an absorbing storyline, and the best of the best employ prose and imagery that resonate in my bones. Behold eight works by Franco-African authors that display all of these qualities.
L’attentat by Yasmina Khadra, Algeria
Yasmina Khadra is the pen name of Franco-Algerian author Mohammed Moulessehoul. Growing up in a military family, Moulessehoul’s career began in the army, where he rose to the rank of special forces commander. His heart, however, was in storytelling, and after secretly publishing several award-winning novels, he left his homeland, then embroiled in civil war, and sought exile in France.
L’attentat tells the story of a prominent Arab-Israeli surgeon, Dr. Amine Jaafari. After a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv, Jaafari works tirelessly to save the victims who are rushed to his hospital’s emergency room. Upon learning that his wife Sihem is among the dead, Jaafari is devastated, but his grief transforms into denial when authorities allege that it was she who blew herself up. After identifying Sihem’s body, however, Jaafari begins a quest to make sense of the impossible. How did he miss the signs of his wife’s indoctrination, and how had she come to believe that violence could solve anything?
Many of Khadra’s books address the problem of Islamic extremism. Yet, his writing conveys the thoughts and circumstances of people who support intolerable acts of violence without turning them into monsters. In L’attentat, Khadra’s main character is caught between two vehemently opposed cultures. As an Israeli-Arab, he often experiences racism from people on both sides of the divide. Yet, as a healer, he is committed to mending even the wounds of his antagonists, whether mental or physical.
You’ll find my longer review here.
English translation: The Attack, by John T. Cullen
Pourquoi tu danses quand tu marches ? by Abdourahman A. Waberi, Djibouti
Abdourahman A. Waberi is an acclaimed novelist, poet, and short-story writer from Djibouti who currently teaches Francophone film and literature at George Washington University. Pourquoi tu danses quand tu marches ? is an autobiographical novel based on the author’s experiences growing up in the 1960s and 70s in the tiny, sun-drenched French territory.
The title refers to a question posed by Waberi’s young daughter, Why do you dance when you walk? Her innocent query provokes a lengthy and mindful reply that sheds light on Waberi’s ancestral influences and the circumstances that left him with an inescapable disability.
Waberi’s namesake, Aden, is the oldest child of a middle-class family that appears to live a comfortable life despite the absence of many everyday conveniences found in Western households at the time. Around the age of 8, Aden is stricken with polio, and the illness, along with medical mismanagement, causes him to walk with a profound limp.
In a culture that values strength and beauty, Aden has few friends or supporters. His classmates taunt him, neighborhood bullies disrupt his comings and goings, even his parents are often annoyed with his frailties and afford him little patience or understanding. His intelligence is his saving grace, recognized and rewarded by his French school teacher, Madame Annick.
Aden’s grandmother Cochise is another source of stability. Rather than pampering Aden, she insists that he not allow himself to be victimized by others. This is easier said than done, but Cochise’s stubborn denial of her grandson’s infirmity makes her an unconventional ally. She is illiterate, but her nomadic upbringing has instilled the gift of storytelling, and this engaging talent is another undeniable factor in Aden’s eventual success as a writer.
Waberi happens to have been my daughter’s professor during two semesters at GWU. As I read, I was impressed that someone who was treated so bitterly during childhood could emerge to become the upbeat and encouraging educator that my daughter would often refer to. This short memoir gave me a glimpse into a childhood that took place in tandem with my own, yet led to an adulthood I would have never predicted.
English translation: Why Do You Dance When You Walk? by David and Nicole Ball
L’Art de perdre by Alice Zeniter, Algeria
One of France’s newest literary superstars is novelist, translator, scriptwriter, and director Alice Zeniter. Zeniter was born in France, but her father’s family immigrated from Algeria shortly after the Algerian War of Independence. In L’Art de Perdre, Zeniter presents the multi-generational story of a Franco-Algerian family. While the book is fictional, it’s clear that Zeniter’s family history parallels that of her main characters.
The book is divided into three parts, beginning with Ali, a relatively prosperous landowner who lives in northern Algeria and is conscripted by France to fight in World War II. After surviving the Battle of Monte Cassino, in Italy, Ali returns home only to find brewing dissatisfaction with the French government. Over time, Ali’s French allegiance erodes his position as a community leader, and eventually, unwilling to join forces with the FLN, Ali is forced to flee to France with his wife and young son, Hamid.
Part 2 follows Hamid’s life. He grows up in a refugee camp in southern France where he faces overt hostility from the French population. As an angry adolescent, he wants nothing to do with his parents’ patrimony. Wishing to consign his Algerian roots to the dust of the Sahara, Hamid embraces assimilation and hides his family’s past from his children.
Part 3 follows Hamid’s daughter Naima, a successful curator in a contemporary art gallery. While organizing a show for an Algerian artist who fled the violent civil war of the 1990s, Naima realizes she knows almost nothing about her heritage. Her father either refuses or no longer remembers enough to share any details with her. Her grandfather has died, leaving her with only a handful of anecdotes. Determined to unbury the past, she heads to Algeria to discover a part of her identity and uncover her family’s secrets.
It’s not surprising that L’Art de Perdre received the 2017 Prix Goncourt des lycéens, as well as Le Monde‘s Prix Litéraire. Zeniter packs so much into this finely crafted saga—war, colonialism, immigration, assimilation, and ultimately an analysis of what can be lost when previous generations are exposed to repeated trauma.
English translation: The Art of Losing by Frank Wynne.
La Civilisation, ma Mère!… by Driss Chraïbi, Morocco
Born in El Jadida and educated in Casablanca, Driss Chraïbi went to Paris in 1945 to study chemistry before turning to literature and journalism. He’s a foundational figure in the world of Franco-African literature, but his first successful novel, Le Passé Simple, published in 1954, provoked significant controversy and was banned in Morocco until 1977.
The passé simple is a French verb tense used only in literature to describe actions that are over and done with. In his first novel, Chraïbi criticizes Moroccan traditionalists who refuse to let go of oppressive and often violent practices. Published at the height of Morocco’s struggle for independence, it’s not surprising that Moroccans resented Chraïbi’s depiction of a backward society hamstrung by evil forces. Many French people also condemned the book for its scandalous content, describing scenes of pedophilia, anti-Semitism, patriarchal brutality, and religious hypocrisy.
In La Civilisation, ma Mère!… two sons recount the life of their Moroccan mother, beginning in the 1930s until the country’s independence. It’s one of the first Franco-African novels to give voice to a female protagonist. Unfulfilled and repressed in her arranged marriage to a much older man, la mère puts her energy into creating a loving environment where her sons can flourish.
Early in the novel, we learn she is illiterate and inconceivably naive, her every movement seemingly under spousal control. Little by little, however, she gains independence, thanks to the encouragement of her two supportive sons, who eventually leave Morocco and settle in France. They teach her to read, and this skill, combined with her favorite radio programs, opens her eyes to the injustice that has been inflicted upon her.
Behind her husband’s back, she studies subjects that her sons have studied: geography, history, anatomy, and other sciences. She goes to the park and the cinema while her husband is working, her intellectual growth following that of her offspring, and her renaissance eventually leads to revolt. The theme is in keeping with Chraïbi’s persistent challenging of traditional beliefs that result in harsh oppression.
English translation: Mother Comes of Age by Hugh A. Harter.
Aya de Yopougon by Marguerite Abouet, Ivory Coast
Marguerite Abouet was born in 1971 in Abidjan, the capital of Ivory Coast. When she was 12 years old, her parents sent her and her brother to live with their uncle in Paris. Far from her homeland, Abouet turned to writing to relieve stress and relive fond childhood memories. Her graphic novel series, Aya de Yopougon, takes place in the late 1970s, when life in Abidjan was relatively prosperous and peaceful.
As a young black woman living in France, Abouet didn’t appreciate the prevalent negative stereotypes of Africa and its people. They didn’t represent the Africa that she knew and loved. “I wanted to show that in Africa there isn’t only war and famine, but also stories of everyday life: people love, argue… That was the Africa that I knew when I was young. That was the life.”
When the publisher Gallimard became interested in producing a graphic novel series based on Abouet’s stories, the choice of illustrator was obvious. Her French husband, Clément Oubrerie, had traveled to Abidjan on several occasions and knew better than anyone Abouet’s vision of the world.
The couple’s combined talents yielded one of my favorite graphic series, Aya de Youpogon. Volume 1 won Best First Album at the Angouleme International Comics Festival, the Children’s Africana Book Award, and the Glyph Award. It has also been included on best lists from The Washington Post, Booklist, Publishers Weekly, and School Library Journal. In 2013, with the backing of TF1 Films, the first two volumes were adapted into a film.
Abouet’s characters are every bit as varied and colorful as those you’ll find in a novel by Dickens or Balzac. The action unfolds in Yopougon, a crowded borough of Abidjan, and Oubrerie’s vibrant frames heighten the humor and optimism that underpin Abouet’s narration.
The series’ prose is peppered with Ivorian slang, le nouchi, and colorful expressions. A petit lexique is found at the end of each volume to help translate their meanings. Abouet also includes a “secret” recipe in every book. Each promises a different benefit. For example, Aya’s mother’s Peanut Sauce never fails to bring her husband home from the office and keep him there for the rest of the evening. These finishing touches further capture the spirit of the time period and setting.
Aya de Yopougon is a story that appeals to the masses. Its portrayals of daily life remind us that most Africans live happily, far from violent regime changes or deplorable living conditions. Aya’s world is a world that Westerners rarely, if ever, contemplate. I regularly recommend this series to both francophone and anglophone friends who are looking for a fun and eye-opening read. You’ll find a longer review here.
English translation: Aya by Helge Dascher.
Petit Pays by Gaël Faye, Burundi
The product of a French father and Rwandan mother, author and composer Gaël Faye was born in Burundi in 1982. In 1994, his family fled the Rwandan Genocide as violence spread into Burundi. They settled in Paris, where Faye began experimenting with hip-hop and rap. In 2008, he formed the music group Milk, Coffee & Sugar with Franco-Cameroonian lyricist and musician Edgar Sekloka.
Faye released his first solo album in 2013, on which he performs the song Petit Pays, paying homage to his native Burundi and decrying the genocide that provoked his family’s exile. Upon hearing the lyrics, a French publisher encouraged Faye to produce a novel on the same theme. The result is the autobiographical work, Petit Pays, which won Le Prix Goncourt des Lycéens in 2016.
Petit Pays is a coming-of-age story. Many aspects of the young protagonist’s early adventures are heart-warmingly wholesome, depicting a childhood of freedom and frolicking with friends. Once war breaks out, however, children living in this part of the world are forced to grow up quickly. The second half of the book intermixes successive waves of danger and disorder with everyday life, as violence and civil unrest infringe upon boyhood stomping grounds. Numerous events in the book are factual, and the central character, Gabriel, and his family are pulled from Faye’s personal history.
Faye currently lives in Rwanda with his wife and two daughters. As further testament to his talent, last year, his latest novel, Jacaranda, won the Prix Renaudot.
English translation: Small Country by Sarah Ardizzone.
Meursault, contre-enquête by Kamel Daoud, Algeria
Kamel Daoud is a Franco-Algerian writer and journalist, and former editor of the French-language daily Le Quotidien d’Oran, for which he produced a popular column, “Raïna Raïkoum” (Our Opinion, Your Opinion). The oldest of six children, Daoud grew up in a bourgeois household but was the only member of his family to pursue higher education. Daoud prefers to write in French, explaining his choice as follows:
« la langue arabe est piégée par le sacré, par les idéologies dominantes. On a fétichisé, politisé, idéologisé cette langue. »
“the Arabic language is enslaved by sacred and dominant ideologies. We have fetishized, politicized, and idealized this language.”
In Meursault, contre-enquête, Daoud invents a life for the nameless Arab from Camus’ classic novel, L’Étranger. In the original story, a French settler living in Algiers murders an Arab man whom he mistakenly judges as posing a threat to his safety. The killer, Meursault, is tried and executed for this senseless act. However, the prosecution’s case hinges on Meursault’s apathetic reaction to his mother’s death rather than on the tragic end to an unknown Arab’s life.
Daoud’s retelling of the classic homicide is performed by his central character, Harun, the younger brother of Camus’ anonymous victim, Moussa. For seventy years, Harun has lived in the shadow of Moussa’s assassination, his overbearing mother continuously disappointed by his failure to live up to his deceased sibling’s example.
Haroun is hardly a sympathetic character, consumed with bitterness, he rails against his mother, France’s toxic intrusion in Algerian history, the evils of Islamic extremism, and the oppressive regime that followed French rule. While Haroun’s diatribe serves as a meditation on Arab identity and the disastrous effects of colonialism, it ultimately aligns with the philosophy of Camus’ original, that human life and the convictions one assigns to it have little meaning.
Last year, Daoud’s Houris won the Prix Goncourt, which explores the trauma inflicted by Algeria’s civil war in the 1990s.
English translation: The Meursault Investigation by John Cullen.
Demain j’aurai vingt ans by Alain Mabanckou, Republic of the Congo
I was first introduced to Alain Mabanckou while enrolled in a literary translation class through NYU’s continuing education program. I no longer recall the passage we were asked to translate, but it was one that our excellent instructor, who was translating one of Mabanckou’s novels, had also wrestled with. Like most assignments in the class, this one took far too many hours to complete. What struck me on this occasion was not the difficulty of the vocabulary but the beauty of the writing. Preserving its richness was no easy feat.
When the semester ended, I looked for Mabanckou at our public library and found Lumières de Pointe-Noire. This memoir interweaves Mabanckou’s adolescence in the Republic of the Congo with his return to his hometown of Pointe-Noire after living in the United States for more than two decades. I gave it five out of five stars, and a couple of years later, while traveling in France, I picked up Mabanckou’s semi-autobiographical novel, Demain j’aurai vingt ans. Again, my assessment was five out of five.
Born in 1966, Mabanckou is a prolific author, having published thirteen novels, eight books of poetry, numerous essays, a cultural dictionary of Africa (co-authored with Abdourahman Waberi), and three children’s books. He once taught Francophone Literature at the University of Michigan, my alma mater, before moving to California to become a full-time professor at UCLA. I hope that the warmer weather is responsible for this relocation rather than a failure on Michigan’s part to recognize his genius.
English translation: Tomorrow I Will Be Twenty Years Old by Helen Stevenson.
Thoughts and Recommendations
Have you read any of these books? If so, what did you think? Perhaps you would like to comment on aspects that I’ve overlooked? Please leave your thoughts regarding these or any other works by Franco-African authors.
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Thanks for the reviews. All of these writers are new to me.
You’re welcome. The world is rich with great writing. The problem is that there is far more mediocre writing that one has to sift through to find it. Plus, we all have different tastes. One person’s masterpiece is the next person’s slog.
Thank you. Very interesting
Happy to be of service. Thanks for stopping by.
I have to admit I haven’t read any of these books, and the only one I know about at all is L’Attentat, due to your own earlier post about it.
I can’t help noticing that four out of the eight authors have their roots in the Maghrib (Algeria or Morocco), which culturally, racially, and historically is really part of the Middle East and the broader Mediterranean world, with very little connection to Sub-Saharan Africa. So you’re really dealing with works from two completely different regions here. I don’t know a lot about the French influence in Sub-Saharan Africa, but I do know that in the Maghrib it runs deep enough to create a real duality in the region’s modern cultural identity, which often leads to conflict. Hence, for example, Daoud’s observation about the Arabic language. In the Maghrib it has come to be associated with Islam, tradition, and puritanical rigidity, whereas French is more associated with secularism and modernity. Both are thus politicized in a way that prevents the choice of which language to use from being a straightforward and neutral thing, as it is in most places.
I can see why Chraïbi’s first novel provoked a lot of resentment. Those who point out the shortcomings and repressions of their own society, especially when that society is engaged in a conflict with an external enemy, are rarely lionized. An objective observer might well declare that “pedophilia, anti-Semitism, patriarchal brutality, and religious hypocrisy” are the most distinctive features of Islam-dominated cultures, but one is supposed to pretend to not notice.
As you say, it seems that Chraïbi continued the same theme, though in a more positive way, in La civilisation, ma Mère, which is clearly a story of liberation from the suffocating miasma of repressive tradition — through literacy, unfettered exposure to ideas, and even physically moving out of the Islamic world to a secular country. I imagine the traditionalists didn’t like that book either. Perhaps I would.
It is interesting how immigrants, their children, and the generations that follow often have very different attitudes toward their ancestral heritage in the country the immigrant generation left (L’Art de Perdre). This happened in my own family to some extent. A divided sense of identity and affiliation can be a painful thing, and I think it takes a somewhat philosophical outlook to handle it.
It’s interesting that the French spoken in the Ivory Coast has enough distinctive words of its own that Aya de Yopougon needs a lexicon to explain them to French people. I assume some of these are borrowings from indigenous languages, but it may be that the French spoken in different places with different cultures is simply evolving apart. That does tend to happen. I’ve heard that the Haïtian and Cajun dialects are now almost unintelligible to French people elsewhere. As this post affirms, French is a widespread language which has grown far beyond the borders of its country of origin — but any language, in a given place, ends up taking on the character of whatever culture is speaking it.
You’re exactly right about Sub-Saharan Africans having a different relationship with the French than people living in the Maghreb do, Infidel. This might be due to the fact that far more Europeans (not only French) settled in that area and put up more of fight to stay there. Just a theory. And, one that doesn’t hold when considering Djibouti.
[By the way, I’ve noticed that you always refer to this region as the Maghrib, using “i” instead of “e”, while I was taught to spell it with an “e” in both French and in English. Forgive me if we’ve discussed this before. Do you know the origins of this difference?]
Knowing the Maghreb as well as you do, I don’t know if the authors from that region would be as compelling for you as those from the other countries. From an intellectual standpoint, however, Daoud’s retelling of L’étranger is pretty striking–if only from a philosophical perspective. It might also prove downright depressing. 🙂
That’s a good point regarding children of immigrants. Kids, especially adolescents, are striving to fit in and inevitably, if their parents were raised in a different culture, they will lack some of the social instincts that their peers come by naturally.
Regarding Abouet’s lexicon, I suspect that all of these authors grew up using (and may still use) words that are unfamiliar to French speakers. Abouet just found a way to include it in her narration. Perhaps a bande dessinée lends itself well to this practice, although one might argue that it’s harder to do in a BD because the prose is far less dense. But, that’s the beauty of artistry. Each author chooses a different set of paints for their palette.
On the spelling of “Maghrib”, that spelling reflects the standard system used in academia for transliterating Arabic words into the Roman alphabet, which in turn is based on the pronunciation of standard Arabic and the spellings of words in the Arabic alphabet. In standard Arabic the last syllable of “Maghrib” sounds like “rib”, so it fits. But Arabic dialects vary a lot from standard pronunciation, especially in the Maghrib, and non-academics tend to write things down the way they sound to them, so there are all kinds of variations in the common spelling of Arabic words in the Roman alphabet.
I’ve long noticed that standard French spellings of proper names from the Maghrib are based on the local dialect pronunciation, very different from standard. For example, Oran would be Wahrân in standard Arabic, and Driss Chraïbi’s name would be Idrîs ash-Sharâyibî. The “Bou” at the beginning of many Algerian names is the local form of standard “Abû”. I assume the “Maghreb” spelling reflects the same kind of local variation. I suppose it makes sense. You probably never hear standard Arabic in the Maghrib except in formal speaking like religious rituals or the TV news.
Great info Infidel. Thanks and you’re right, I have little insight into Arabic.
PS: The links for the English translations of Mother Comes of Age, Aya, and Small Country go to the wrong places at Goodreads.
Whoa! I’ll look into it. Thanks for checking.
Compliments on your reviews. The only one I’m familiar with is Daoud. His French is superb… Yet he has had to leave Algeria for his safety. And now, he was supposed to go to Italy to promote his last book. But Algeria has launched international arrest warrants against him. And there is a risk that he could be arrested in Italy then deported to Algeria…
Quel triste monde celui qui se forme sous nos yeux…
On what conceivable grounds would the Algerian regime be able to convince any non-Islamic state to arrest Daoud? Especially Italy, where the current government was elected partly to reject kowtowing to Islamists. Europe really needs to strengthen its commitment to free speech.
Yes, Europe has to do that. I believe it’s a combination of cowardice. Meloni is trying to strengthen links with all North Africa to stop the massive migration problem which Italy is getting… 90%? Then Macron, (whom I dislike every day more) is incapable of lifting his phone and ask Meloni to publicly welcome Daoud… Macron has treated Meloni very bad from the start, “she’s the heir apparent to the Italian facists…”
Wow! A very tricky web of tight ropes to walk. Thanks for adding you perspective Brieuc.
Not sure whether it is perspective or ranting…
Haha. Probablement les deux. 🙂
That’s a good question Infidel. I wonder if Algeria’s action is mainly symbolic. Nevertheless, it’s tragic that these authors have to live under tremendous strain. An Algerian iman issued a fatwa against Daoud after he published Meursault, contre-enquête.
I didn’t know about the arrest warrants for Daoud, Brieuc. That’s maddening and also seems ridiculously impractical. I’m surprised that Italy would cooperate with such a demand. The Algerian government is showing itself to be exactly the kind of repressive regime that it condemns people for accusing it of being. The author Boualem Sansal is another example. He’s an old man, all of whose books are banned in Algeria, yet are highly popular there. He’s now serving a 5 year sentence for alleging in an interview that France unfairly ceded Moroccan territory to Algeria during the colonial era. These people aren’t blowing up buildings. They’re stating opinions and writing books that are billed as fictional.
Sadly, Sansal has cancer and it’s doubtful he’s being treated for it.
It is maddening. And neither is France doing anything serious for Sansal… ‘Tis a bad, bad world m’dear friend…
I have read Petit Pays, and Daoud.
There’s also Leïla Slimani, with Le pays des autres for instance.
And of course the giant Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, with La plus secrète mémoire des hommes (Prix Goncourt). Though it looks like to really understand this book you need to be familiar with several other African authors, so I haven’t tried it
Interesting, Emma. I’ve read short pieces by Slimani but never one of her books. It’s not fair to judge her on one interview question that she once answered in which she raved about a book (by an American author) that I found solidly mediocre. Did you like Le pays des autres?
I’d not heard of “the giant Mohamed Sarr”. Thanks for mentioning someone who seems to be another shining example.
Faye’s Petit Pays is a wonderful book, a great read. I have his Jacaranda waiting for me next. And Daoud’s book was a very interesting response to Camus’. As for other Franco-African writers, La plus secrète memoire des hommes was magnificent, the best Goncourt winner of the past few years. By contrast, NDiaye’s Trois femmes puissantes might have won the Goncourt but didn’t do a thing for me, and Diop’s Frère d’âme similarly left me cold.
Thanks for weighing in Keith. I’ll be digging into Jacaranda soon as well. Will look for La plus secrète mémoire… when I’m in France this fall. I appreciate your recommendations.