Novel · A way to begin
The Suns of Independence
Les Soleils des indépendances
Ahmadou Kourouma · 1968
Synopsis
In the wake of independence, in the capital of a West African country, Fama Doumbouya, last descendant of a line of Malinke princes, has nothing left of his rank: the new regime has reduced him to fending for himself. He goes from funeral to funeral in the big city, offering his services and collecting a few alms. Salimata, his wife, carries the wound of a youth that was violated and the grief of having been unable to give him a child.
Context
Offered without success to several French publishers, the manuscript was awarded a prize by a Montreal journal, Études françaises, and appeared from the Presses de l'université de Montréal in 1968; Éditions du Seuil took it up in Paris in 1970. The novel writes French in the manner of Malinke: Gisèle Prignitz sees in it the project of writing a Malinke novel in French, and the title itself plays on the word télé, which means at once the sun, the day and the era. Adrian Adams published the English translation in 1981.
Who it is for
A novel in French whose language follows the turns of phrase of Malinke; it is on the final-year syllabus in Côte d'Ivoire, according to baccalaureate revision sheets.
Prizes and reception
Prize of the journal Études françaises in 1968, Grand Prix littéraire d'Afrique noire in 1969 and the Maillé-Latour-Landry prize of the Académie française in 1970.
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