Alain Mabanckou

Alain Mabanckou born 24 February 1966 is a novelist journalist poet and academic a French citizen born in the Republic of the Congo he is currently a Professor of Literature at UCLA He is best known for his novels and nonfiction writing depicting the experience of contemporary Africa and the African diaspora in France He is among the best known and most successful writers in the French language and one of the best known African writers in France In some circles in Paris he is known as the Samuel Beckett of Africa Mabanckou is also controversial and has been criticized by some African and diaspora writers for stating that Africans bear responsibility for their own misfortune He has argued against the idea that African and Caribbean writers should focus on their local realities in order to serve and express their communities He further contends that categories such as nation race and territory fall short of encapsulating reality and urges writers to create works that deal with issues beyond these subjects Alain Mabanckou was born in CongoBrazzaville in 1966 He spent his childhood in the coastal city of PointeNoire where he received his baccalaureate in Letters and Philosophy at the Lycée Karl Marx After preliminary law classes at the Marien Ngouabi University in Brazzaville he received a scholarship to go to France at the age of 22 He already had several manuscripts to his name mostly collections of poems which he began publishing three years later After receiving a postgraduate Diploma in Law from the Université ParisDauphine he worked for about ten years for the group SuezLyonnaise des Eaux Mabanckou dedicated himself increasingly to writing after the publication of his first novel BleuBlancRouge BlueWhiteRed which won him the Grand prix littéraire dAfrique noire in 1999 Since then he has continued to regularly publish prose as well as poetry His African Psycho 2003 is a novel written from the point of view of Gregoire Nakobomayo a fictional African serial killer Mabanckou is best known for his fiction notably Verre cassé Broken Glass a comic novel centered on a Congolese former teacher and life in the bar he now frequents Verre cassé has also been the subject of several theatrical adaptations It was published in English translation as Broken Glass in 2009 Source Article Alain Mabanckou from Wikipedia in English licensed under CCBYSA 30