Martinique (France) / All works
Novel
Texaco
Patrick Chamoiseau · 1992
Synopsis
In the Texaco district, a shanty town on the outskirts of Fort-de-France, an urban planner has come to raze the shacks. Marie-Sophie Laborieux, who founded the district, sets out to persuade him to spare them. To do so she goes back as far as slavery and retraces nearly a hundred and fifty years of Martinican history, through the life of her father, Esternome, born on a plantation, then through her own.
Context
Texaco came out from Gallimard in 1992 and received the Prix Goncourt that same year. The book mixes Marie-Sophie's words, extracts from her notebooks and the notes of a “Word Scratcher” who gathers her testimony, as well as those of the urban planner. It follows the island's history from the 1820s, from the plantation to the city, through a family descended from slavery. The novel appeared in English in 1997, under the same title, in a translation by Rose-Myriam Réjouis and Val Vinokurov.
Who it is for
For reading the history of Martinique told from below, by those who built the city on its margins.
Prizes and reception
Prix Goncourt in the year of its publication, 1992; the English version, five years later, kept the name of the district as its title.