French- Senegalese woman set to make history

As organizers get set to unveil the winner for this year’s France’s leading literary prize, a French-Senegalese woman has been tipped as favorite to win it.

At 42, Marie Ndiaye, born to a French mother and a Senegalese father, will make history by becoming the first black woman writer to bag the top prize next week for her novel on family, betrayal and the domineering issue of illegal migration. Maria has been described as a frontrunner among the rest of the eight authors short listed for the Goncourt, said to be the most prestigious of France’s annual crop of literary prizes. This announcement is set for November 2.

Marie is already an established writer, a career she commenced at the age of 12. At 17 she published her first novel, Quant au riche avenir, when she was still in school. After which she went on to write a further six novels, all published by Minuit, and a collection of short stories. She has since made a name in the French literary world as a recognized novelist, screenwriter and playwright. She is the co-author of a film with French director Claire Denis, “White Material”, depicting whites terrorized by child soldiers in West Africa. In 2001, she won the Prix Femina for her novel Rosie Carpe.

Marie also wrote her Comédie Classique, a two-hundred page novel made up of a single sentence, which was published by POL at the age of 21. Her play Papa doit manger has been taken into the repertoire of the Comédie française, only the second play by a female writer to be taken into the repertoire of the Comédie française.

According to records, Marie NDiaye would not only be the first woman laureate of the Goncourt in a decade, but she will also be the first black woman in its history. “I have never thought of it in those terms: ‘black woman’ and ‘Goncourt’. I find it impossible to see things that way,” AFP quoted Ndiaye as saying; in an apparent attempt to blush aside any attempt to make her appear content with such a symbolic status.

Marie, whose father left for his native Senegal at earlier, is more accustomed with French life, having been brought up by her French mother away from her father’s native Senegal. But the writer is not taking life for granted, alluding to the fact that her status as a celebrated writer had somehow saved her from the troubles of the existing discrimination abound in French society.

“I grew up in a world that was 100-percent French. My African roots don’t mean much, except that people know of them because of the colour of my skin and my name,” she said.