Poetry
Éthiopiques
Not translated into English
Léopold Sédar Senghor · 1956
Synopsis
Eighteen poems, united by a broad verse line. The first part celebrates Africa and its figures: the River Congo, the Kaya-Magan, the Queen of Sheba in seven songs, New York, where the steel city is set against the tom-tom of Harlem, and Chaka, a dramatic poem in two songs on the Zulu king. Then come the epistles to a white princess who stayed behind in France, followed by elegies around the absent beloved, the last of which are addressed to God and to the Virgin. The collection presents itself as a score, to be spoken to varied rhythms.
Context
The title comes from the Greek word for the Black man, with the burnt face, and from Pindar's odes, Olympian or Pythian: Africa and Hellenism are bound together from the cover. The collection gathers poems written since 1948 and extends the two previous books; the poem of Chaka adapts for the stage Thomas Mofolo's novel on the Zulu hero. A postface, entitled Comme les lamantins vont boire à la source, defends the poetry of négritude and makes rhythm and emotion the foundation of African art; it is now read as an autonomous manifesto.
Who it is for
Long poems in broad verses, which call for reading aloud. The afterword can be read on its own, as a manifesto of cultural mixing.
Prizes and reception
Studied in francophone classrooms, it received a critical and annotated edition by Papa Guèye N'Diaye in 1974, in Dakar.
Sources for this page 5
The pages consulted to check this page.