Rencontres essentielles: An MLA Text Edition (MLA Texts and Translations) - Softcover

Kuoh-Moukoury, Thérèse

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0873527933 ISBN 13: 9780873527934

Publisher: Modern Language Association of America, 2002

Synopsis

Published in 1969, Recontres essentielles is the first novel by a woman of sub-Saharan francophone Africa. Thrse Kuoh-Moukoury, of Cameroon, wrote it "to inspire other women to write." Its story of love, infertility, a failed marriage, and adultery looks at both interpersonal connections and national politics from a feminist perspective.

In the introduction the volume editor, Cheryl Toman, provides valuable background with a discussion of African matriarchy, past and present; ethnic groups in Cameroon; interracial relationships; and polygamy as it affects women's roles in the family and their interaction with one another.

About this title

About the Author:

Thrse Kuoh-Moukoury(b. 1938) is a novelist, journalist, children's rights lawyer, and activist who is committed to the cause of African women. Currently she divides her time between Paris and Cameroon and is working on her second novel, based on the life of the political martyr Alexandre Douala Manga Bell.

Cheryl Toman is associate professor of modern languages and literatures at Case Western Reserve University. She is the author of Contemporary Matriarchies in Cameroonian Francophone Literature and the editor of Defying the Global Language: Perspectives in Ethnic Studies.

Review:

This wonderful short novel is an ideal introduction to francophone literature and culture for both undergraduate and graduate students. It is very readable and offers a useful perspective on race and gender in the late colonial period. Franoise Lionnet, author of Autobiographical Voices and Postcolonial Representations

About this edition

• Publisher: Modern Language Association of America
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0873527933
• ISBN 13: 9780873527934
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 88
• Editor: Toman Cheryl