Maryse Condé Libros

Maryse Condé's personal journey of discovery and revelation becomes ours as we learn of Victoire, her white-skinned mestiza grandmother who worked as a cook for the Walbergs, a family of white Creoles, in the French Antilles. Using her formidable skills as a storyteller, Condé describes her grandmother as having "Australian whiteness for the color of her skin...She jarred with my world of women in Italian straw bonnets and men necktied in three-piece linen suits, all of them a very black shade of black. She appeared to me doubly strange." Victoire was spurred by Condé's desire to learn of her family history, resolving to begin her quest by researching the life of her grandmother. While uncovering the circumstances of Victoire's unique life story, Condé also comes to grips with a haunting question: How could her own mother, a black militant, have been raised in the Walberg's home, a household of whites? Creating a work that takes you into a time and place populated with unforgettable characters that inspire and amaze, Condé's blending of memoir and imagination, detective work and storytelling artistry, is a literary gem that you won't soon forget.

Ivan and Ivana are twins with a bond so strong they become afraid of their feelings. As young adults in Paris, Ivana joins the police while Ivan walks the path of radicalisation. Unable to live with or without each other, become perpetrator and victim in a wave of violent attacks. With her most impressive novel to date, this master storyteller offers an impressive picture of a colourful yet turbulent 21st century.

Condé's story is rich and colorful and glorious. It sprawls over continents and centuries to find its way into the reader's heart Maya Angelou

For nearly four decades, Maryse Condé, best known for her novels Segu and Windward Heights, has been at the forefront of French Caribbean literature. In this collection of essays and lectures, written over many years and in response to the challenges posed by a changing world, she reflects on the ideas and histories that have moved her. From the use of French as her literary language--despite its colonial history--to the agonies of the Middle Passage, at the horrors of African dictatorship, and the politically induced poverty of the Caribbean to migration under globalization, Condé casts her unflinching eye over the world which is her inheritance, her burden, and her future. Even while paying homage to her intellectual and literary influences--including Frantz Fanon, Leopold Sedar Senghor, and Aimé Césaire--Condé establishes in these pages the singularity of her vision and the reason for the enormous admiration that her writing has garnered from readers and critics alike.

At the age of seven, Tituba watched as her mother was hanged for daring to wound a plantation owner who tried to rape her. She was raised from then on by Mama Yaya, a gifted woman who shared with her the secrets of healing and magic. But it was Tituba's love of the slave John Indian that led her from safety into slavery, and the bitter, vengeful religion practiced by the good citizens of Salem, Massachusetts. Though protected by the spirits, Tituba could not escape the lies and accusations of that hysterical time.As history and fantasy merge, Maryse Condé, acclaimed author of Tree of Life and Segu, creates the richly imagined life of a fascinating woman.

"Francis Sancher always said he would come to an unnatural end. So when this handsome newcomer to the Guadeloupean village of Rivière au Sel is found dead, face down in the mud, no one is particularly surprised. Loved by some - especially women - and reviled by others, Francis was an enigmatic figure. Where did he come from? What caused his strange nocturnal wanderings? What devils haunted him? As the villagers come to pay their respects, they each reveal another piece of the mystery behind his life and death - and their own buried secrets and stories come to light."--Provided by publisher.

The narrative centers on Dieudonné Sabrina, a young black gardener accused of murdering his wealthy white employer and lover, Loraine. As he seeks refuge on his sailboat, La Belle Créole, the story unfolds through flashbacks during a tumultuous night in Port-Mahault, Guadeloupe. Set against a backdrop of social unrest and labor strikes, the novel explores themes of identity, race, and the uncertain futures of both Dieudonné and the island itself. Condé's work weaves a complex tale of desperation and societal decay.

Babakar is an African doctor living alone until the child Anaïs comes into his life. Forced to abandon his solitude, he takes her to Haiti in search of her family.

Born in Guadeloupe, Ivan and Ivana are twins with a bond so strong they become afraid of their feelings for one another. When their mother sends them off to live with their father in Mali they begin to grow apart, until, as young adults in Paris, Ivana’s youthful altruism compels her to join the police academy, while Ivan, stunted by early experiences of rejection and exploitation, walks the path of radicalization. The twins, unable to live either with or without each other, become perpetrator and victim in a wave of violent attacks. In The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana, Maryse Condé, winner of the 2018 Alternative Nobel prize in literature, touches upon major contemporary issues such as racism, terrorism, political corruption, economic inequality, globalization, and migration. With her most modern novel to date, this master storyteller offers an impressive picture of a colorful yet turbulent 21st century.