Expanding My Francophone Literature Knowledge-Rwanda

During my last trip to France in June of 2014, I bought a bunch of French books-novels, short stories, and plays. I've only managed to actually read one of them until now. 'Ive heard about some other exciting new authors and works, but have been so consumed by teaching tried and true texts, that I haven't been able to actually read them. A key goal this summer is to finally rectify that.

I started with Scholastique Mukasonga's collection, Ce que murmurent les collines: Nouvelles rwandaises.

A big reason I began with this, is I anticipate offering an upper level French survey of literature class in the spring. There is an anthology I'm interested in using as the textbook, but I wanted to round out the readings with others that expand the scope of the francophone world. I know a decent amount about Rwanda's genocide, but not much else and reading this was one small step to fixing that.

Moreover, since these are "nouvelles," they are likely to be relatively easy to integrate into the course. Each is between 15 and 30 pages. Each evokes Rwanda, but often in subtle ways that are perfect for that course. This group has heard about many different francophone countries and knows some of the key issues that impact many of them (colonization, the process of gaining independence, forging their own path, gender codes, racial differences, etc). They are at the point that they need the chance to apply their analytical skills and dig beneath the surface to uncover the issues and explore they ways they are expressed by individual authors.

I will add posts when I finish the book. So far there are intriguing references to the oral tradition, gender roles, education and lack of literacy, subtle allusions to the ethnic tensions that caused the genocide, and a fascinating differentiation between Rwandan culture and W. African traditions like griots (which are so central, even sacred, to the francophone [West] African canon).