Ahmadou Kourouma

Ahmadou Kourouma (Source: English Wikipedia) On 11 December 2003, Ivorian novelist and actuary Ahmadou Kourouma died in Lyon. He was probably the best-known Francophone African writer in France and was sometimes referred to as the 'African Voltaire'.

Kourouma was born on 27 November 1927 in Boundiali, Côte d'Ivoire. He attended secondary school in Bamako, Mali, until he was expelled and was drafted into the French army. He was sent to Indochina and served in Saigon. Later he studied mathematics in Lyon. Kourouma returned to his native Côte d'Ivoire after it won its independence in 1960, yet he quickly found himself questioning the government of Félix Houphouët-Boigny. After brief imprisonment, Kourouma spent several years in exile, first in Algeria (1964–69), then in Cameroon (1974–84) and Togo (1984–94), before finally returning to live in Côte d'Ivoire.

His first novel, Les soleils des indépendances satirised contemporary African politics. It was produced first in Canada in 1968 (Presses de l'Université de Montréal), having been rejected by French publishers. In 1998, he published En attendant le vote des bêtes sauvages, a satire of postcolonial Africa in the style of Voltaire in which a griot recounts the story of a tribal hunter's transformation into a dictator, inspired by President Gnassingbé Eyadéma of Togo. At the time of his death, in Lyon, he was working on a sequel to Allah n'est pas obligé, entitled Quand on refuse on dit non, in which the protagonist of the first novel, a child soldier, is demobilised and returns to his home in Côte d'Ivoire, where a new regional conflict has arisen. His work also includes theatre plays and children's literature.

In France, each of Ahmadou Kourouma's novels has been greeted with great acclaim, sold exceptionally well, and been showered with prizes including the Prix Renaudot and the Prix Goncourt des Lycéens.

(Source: Wikipedia)