Mariz Konde

Marise Condé is called the “grand dame of Francophone literature.” She is the author of novels, plays, and nonfiction works that, in close dialogue with Western literature, address and bring to life the legacies of colonialism and slavery in Africa and the Caribbean, unleashing their destructive force as no one had done before her. Condé’s stories are fierce; her pages contain impeccably profound analysis, are always beautifully written, and possess a sharp sense of humor. Nothing was foreign to this prolific writer — in addition to journalism, essays, and several miscellaneous works, she published eighteen novels and nine plays. Condé’s works, translated into many other languages, transformed Francophone literature. She studied at the Lycée Fénelon in Paris and then at the Sorbonne. In 1959 she married the Guinean actor Mamadou Condé and took her husband’s surname. She taught in Guinea, Ghana, Senegal, France, and the United States (at Columbia University until 2004 and at other American universities), and worked as a journalist. She headed the Committee for the Memory of Slavery, established in France in 2004. At her suggestion, May 10 has been observed in France as a day of remembrance of slavery since 2006. In her later years, she lived in Guadeloupe and New York.