Poetry
Red Earth
Latérite
Véronique Tadjo · 1984
Synopsis
Poems born of a crossing of the Sahara, from France to the Ivory Coast, and turned towards the north of the country, that of the Senufo, whose rites and spirituality the author salutes. The savannah landscapes, the red earth that gives the book its title, love and separation recur from page to page, along with the fragmented side of modern life.
Context
The collection appeared in 1984 from Hatier, in the Monde noir poche series, and was reissued in 1991 with the Centre d'édition et de diffusion africaines. The author says she wrote it along the way, during the journey that took her across the desert, in the early eighties, through Morocco, Algeria and Niger, and conceived it as a tribute to Senufo culture, which she had come to know while teaching in Korhogo. Peter S. Thompson published a bilingual edition of it in 2006, with a preface by Abiola Irele and illustrated by the author; Points reissued it in 2024, followed by a previously unpublished set of texts.
Who it is for
A brief collection of just under a hundred pages, in French; the bilingual edition of 2006 gives the English text alongside.
Prizes and reception
Literary prize of the Agency for Cultural and Technical Cooperation, in 1983, for this first collection by its author.
Sources for this page 4
The pages consulted to check this page.