The over-intellectualisation of desire—Efemia Chela reviews Anne Garréta’s newly translated memoir Not One Day
The JRB Francophone and Contributing Editor Efemia Chela reviews Not One Day, Anne Garréta’s memoir and the second of her books to be…
Category: Francophonie
[Temporary Sojourner] Efemia Chela reads Roland Rugero’s Baho!—the first Burundian novel to be translated into English
Ableism and the silent roar: The JRB Francophone and Contributing Editor Efemia Chela travels to Burundi with Roland Rugero’s novel Baho! in The…
Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ’s novel Nairobi Heat is now available in French as Là où meurent les rêves
« Qu’est-ce que ça te fait à toi, l’homme noir d’Amérique, d’être au Kenya ? » Voilà une question qui taraude l’inspecteur Ishmael….
What we talk about when we talk about French: New words enter the 2019 Larousse and Le Robert
The French language is notoriously conservative. There is even a congregation of very serious people—l’Académie française—that decides how the language…
The JRB Exclusive: Read an excerpt from An Eternity in Tangiers, a graphic novel that evokes the mental and physical limbo of migrancy, by Faustin Titi and Eyoum Nganguè
The JRB is proud to present an exclusive excerpt from the graphic novel An Eternity in Tangiers, by Ivorian illustrator…
Un si beau diplôme !—Rwandese author and genocide survivor Scholastique Mukasonga chronicles her quest for an education in new book
Comment sauver son enfant d’une mort certaine ? Faut-il, comme le croit le père de l’auteur, faire confiance à l’école…
Mais non, Monsieur le Président! Alain Mabanckou and Véronique Tadjo take on Macron
French President Emmanuel Macron has made his support of the French language, Francophonie and the French-speaking world (especially the African…
Skin and the Arab Spring: Read an excerpt from Tunisian author Azza Filali’s Les Intranquilles
Words without Borders’s issue dedicated to Tunisian women writers got lost in the flurry of the end of 2017, with…
Snapshots of Death: Allegorical short fiction from Algerian writer Chawki Amari
Two men are talking in a smoke-filled room. On the carved table in the middle of the sitting room is…
Sea-shaken love from ‘The Cargo Hold of Stars’ by Mauritian poet Khal Torabully
« Et ta bouche est une syllabe mûre que seule l’empreinte des mots d’amour » Whether you have a valentine…
[Conversation Issue] Using language without restraint to show the energy of the ‘wretched of the earth’—Fiston Mwanza Mujila chats to Bongani Kona
As part of our January Conversation Issue, Bongani Kona interviews award-winning Congolese author Fiston Mwanza Mujila. Tram 83 Fiston Mwanza…
Guinean author Tierno Monénembo honoured with Grand Prix de la Francophonie
Guinean novelist and biochemist Tierno Monénembo received the Grand Prix de la Francophonie at a ceremony late last year at…
« Le bébé est mort. » Leïla Slimani explodes the French home in the newly translated Lullaby
The English translation of French–Moroccan author Leïla Slimani’s award-winning novel, Chanson Douce, is out this month. The book, the title…
Theatre and family trees: A new short story by Moroccan writer Driss Ksikes
Driss Ksikes gives us a vivid intergenerational short story in ‘Fuckin’ Family’ (‘Putain la famille’). For a long time, family…
Éric Vuillard wins the 2017 Prix Goncourt for his novel L’ordre du jour
Éric Vuillard has won the Prix Goncourt 2017 for his book on the rise of Hitler, L’ordre du jour. The…
Fear and loathing in Bordeaux: Race and the French myth in Marie NDiaye’s My Heart Hemmed In
Efemia Chela reviews Marie NDiaye’s newly translated masterpiece My Heart Hemmed In, a mixture of literary fiction, psychological thriller and…
‘The youth cannot be fooled’: Alain Mabanckou believes a Sub-Saharan African Spring is imminent
Since August, Congolese-French author Alain Mabanckou has been posting enigmatic pictures and tweeting with the hashtag #RevolutionBassinDuCongo (samples below). Known…
New Ça va, ça va le monde! radio play features The Belly of the Atlantic by Senegalese author Fatou Diome
Radio France Internationale’s series of radio plays of contemporary Francophone literature, « Ça va, ça va le monde ! »…
From the fringe to the centre: Meet ‘The New French’ in the latest issue of Words Without Borders
The French-language literary tradition distinguishes between ‘French’ or ‘hexagonal’ literature, written by authors born in France (the hexagon), and ‘Francophone’…
Mauritian author Ananda Devi wins the 2017 Firecracker Award for Fiction for Eve Out of Her Ruins
Mauritian author Ananda Devi’s Eve Out of Her Ruins has been highly lauded since appearing in English, in late 2016,…
New translation of Marie NDiaye’s psychological drama My Heart Hemmed In
Since her first literary outing at seventeen with the novel Quant au riche avenir, Marie NDiaye has challenged and beguiled both readers…
Literary activism in Côte d’Ivoire: Edwige-Renée Dro explains the Abidjan Lit phenomenon
Africa has a language problem. We don’t read enough in our indigenous languages, and we don’t read in the same…
The Johannesburg Review of Books Vol. 1, Issue 3 (July 2017)
The third issue of The Johannesburg Review of Books is here, with some big reviews, in-depth interviews and quality ruminations…
‘Les chaussures’: Short fiction by Edwige-Renée Dro from new translation experiment La Shamba
La Shamba is a newly launched South to South writing collaboration project bringing a diversity of language and viewpoints to…
Keep on Swinging: Fiston Mwanza Mujila’s Tram 83 wins the German International Literature Award
Fiston Mwanza Mujila has been awarded the The German International Literature Award for the German translation of his novel, Tram 83. Since…
The Johannesburg Review of Books Vol. 1, Issue 2 (June 2017)
The second issue of The Johannesburg Review of Books is here—replete with some of the finest writing on books and…
New release: Another Morocco by Abdellah Taia
English readers interested in Abdellah Taïa’s work are in luck. Taïa, the first openly gay Moroccan author to be published…
New translation of select essays by Mohamed Kacimi
Over at Asymptote Journal, a selection of Algerian writer Mohamed Kacimi’s essays have been translated from French into English by…
The limits of counterfactual fiction: Percy Zvomuya reviews Bertène Juminer’s Bozambo’s Revenge and Michel Houellebecq’s Submission
La Revanche de Bozambo / Bozambo’s Revenge Bertène Juminer Présence Africaine, 1968 (French ed.)/Three Continents Press, 1968 (English ed.) Submission…