Hello Gentle Reader,
Renowned as a Grand Dame of French Literature and giant of French Caribbean Literature, Maryse Condé was always introduced on cyclonic winds rivaling the reverence of a hurricane. Yet in interviews and engagements, Maryse Condé never appears to be aloof or distantly Olympian in her engagement. Instead, Condé was warm, earthly, and generous with her intellect and insight. This only proved that the veneration that was attributed to Condé, was justly deserved. As a writer from Guadeloupe, Condé reckoned with colonial experiences and postcolonial perspectives of the small island nation. A narrative autopsy of colonialism is one of the essential components of Maryse Condé’s literary oeuvre, providing the entry point to further discussions regarding race, the female experience, and slavery, through a variety of locales and historical time periods. This is most famously seen in her novel “I, Tituba: The Black Witch of Salem,” a novel renowned for its subversive critique of racial and sexist themes from a historical perspective as a reflection of contemporary issues. “I, Tituba: The Black Witch of Salem,” showed Maryse Condé as a high literary operative, by being both academically critical and rigorous, but also engaging with readers on a level of enjoyment. “Segu,” published two years before “I, Tituba: The Black Witch of Salem,” provided evidence of Maryse Condé epicist capacities. The novel once again takes place within a historical setting, but subverts and reignites the narrative of (for lack of better terms,) ‘the African Diaspora,’ by usurping preconceived notions and presenting a new chronicle. “Segu,” recounts the story of an African royal family who must contend with a multitude of changing social principles and outside influences, such as burgeoning slave trade, the spread of Islam and Christianity, and white colonialization, all of which violently tear apart the social order and fabric of the kingdom. In a similar fashion to Chinua Achebe and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Maryse Condé has rewritten and reinvented the African narrative, dispelling the spurious notions that the continent was merely ‘ripe for the taking,’ or anarchistic and susceptible for chaos, requiring the modernizing guidance of third-party influences. “Windward Heights,” proved Maryse Condé was not just an epicist and visionary novelist, but a playful writer who embraced postmodern and pastiche literary techniques, by revising and reimagining Emily Brontë’s brooding grey and gothic novel: “Wuthering Heights,” onto the island of Guadeloupe with a new angle and slant. Maryse Condé was a formidable writer and warmly recognized around the world as one of the greatest contemporary French language writers of the time and a monolith of French Caribbean literature. Often whispered and speculated as a potential Nobel Laureate in Literature, Maryse Condé received the conciliatory prize in 2018, when she accepted the “New Academy Prize in Literature,” which sought to console the public at the postponement of the Nobel Prize in Literature for the year. Condé proved herself to be generous and magnanimous once again at receiving the award, thanking the expedited academy for the honour. Despite her advancing age and her failing eyesight, Maryse Condé continued to write (with assistance), her last novel “The Gospel According to the New World,” was originally published in 2021 and translated to English in 2023, whereby it was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize.
Rest in Peace Maryse Condé.
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
No comments:
Post a Comment