[Review of] Rene Maran. Batouala

Authors

Angelo Costanzo

Orginal Publication Date

1989

Journal Title

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Volume

9

Issue

ess/vol9/iss1

First Page

54

Last Page

55

Abstract

This book is a long-neglected product of the 1920s negritude movement, in which a new kind of primi ti vis tic in terest concerning the lives of black men and women in the African Diaspora took hold in the literary words of Europe and America. Batouala was written in French by Rene Maran, an Afro-Caribbean writer living in Paris in the 1920s, who had worked for several years in what was then known as French Equatorial Africa. This edition is a reprint of a 1972 English translation that adheres to the lyrical, sensuous style of Maran's prose and that follows the revised and unexpurgated version Maran approved of for publication in 1938. The book has been brought back into print in an inexpensive paperback format, which now makes this first great novel about Africa written by a black person readily available for use in literature classes and also for general reading by a wide public audience.

Rights

Copyright, ​©EES, The National Association for Ethnic Studies, 1989