Synopsis
As the most successful female writer from Francophone Africa, Calixthe Beyala occupies an unusual place in French literary and popular culture. Her novels are bestsellers, and she appears regularly on French television and radio, yet her reputation has in recent years been tarnished by allegations of plagiarism. She is lauded both as a consecrated, best-selling ‘authentic’ African author and a proven literary ‘fake’, found guilty of plagiarism in the High Court in Paris but in the same year awarded the highly prestigious Grand Prix du roman de l’Académie Française for one of the novels in which she had allegedly plagiarized.

In Calixthe Beyala, Nicki Hitchcott considers Beyala as an icon and a writer. She explores representations of Beyala in the media, the varied critical responses to her writing, and Beyala’s efforts to position herself as a champion of women’s rights in Africa. Hitchcott pays equal attention to the novels themselves, tracing their explorations of the role of migration in the creation of personal identity. Calixthe Beyala is a nuanced attempt to understand the work – and public role – of one of the most important women writing today.

'Rigorous in its scholarship, Hitchcott's Calixthe Beyala is an invaluable and accessible resource for both specialists and the reader coming to Beyala's work for the first time.' Modern Language Review

Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures 5

192pp, 234 x 156mm, cased only

Published October 2006