“WHEN I GROW up I want to be a mechanic, so nothing ever stays broken in my life,” says Gaby, the 10-year-old narrator of Small Country, the English translation of the French-language novel Petit Pays, the literary debut by long-time rapper Gael Faye which has sold more than 700,000 copies, been translated into 35 languages, and […]
Tag Archives: rwandan literature
Rapper-Turned-Novelist Gael Faye’s Small Country Stirringly Captures a Dark Moment in Burundi’s History
France-based Burundian artist Gael Faye has met success since stepping into literature from hip hop. His novel Small Country, first published in French in 2016 as Petit Pays, came out in English in June from Penguin Random House and Hogarth, translated by Sarah Ardizzone, and has been one of the gems of 2018. Starting in 1992 in Burundi, […]
Scholastique Mukasonga’s Novel, Our Lady of the Nile, in Film Production as Short Story Appears in The New Yorker
Rwanda’s best known contemporary writer, Scholastique Mukasonga, author of the novel Our Lady of the Nile (2015) and the memoir Cockroaches (2016), has a new short story and interview in The New Yorker. The story, titled “Cattle Praise Song,” is translated from French by Melanie Mauthner. “I was seven years old and puffed up with pride; I was […]
Excerpt | Clemantine Wamariya’s Rwandan Genocide Survival Memoir, The Girl Who Smiled Beads
The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After is a devastating, beautiful memoir of Clemantine Wamariya’s survival of the Rwandan Genocide of 1994. The book, released by Penguin Random House on 24 April, 2018, is co-written with Elizabeth Weilis, a writer-at-large for The New York Times Magazine. It follows Wamariya from six years of […]
Clemantine Wamariya’s The Girl Who Smiled Beads Is a Devastating, Beautiful Memoir of Surviving the Rwandan Genocide
Clemantine Wamariya first came to our attention in 2015 with her essay in Matter titled “Everything Is Yours, Everything Is Not Yours” and co-written with Elizabeth Weilis. The essay was featured in our reflection on the fictionalisation of violence, and it is exciting to see that it had always been part of a book-in-progress. The Girl […]
Shortlist for Rwanda’s Huza Press Prize for Fiction Announced
In January, we ran a feature on how the Huza Press Prize for Fiction is reshaping Rwandan literature. We also announced the release of its longlist. And now their shortlist is out. Congratulations to the shortlisted writers. The winner will be announced on 18 March. Here are the ten entries chosen. 1. “Safe,” by Dominique […]
SPECIAL FEATURE | How the Huza Press Prize for Fiction Is Reshaping Rwandan Literature
It was the pressing need to reclaim our narrative, which as many of you are aware was being largely told by non-Rwandans. To date any mention of Rwanda is closely followed by the word genocide and, as vital as this is to our history, it is not our only experience. — Louise Umutoni. IN 2009, […]
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