The Death of Comrade President
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4.0 • 1 Rating
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
In Pointe-Noire, in the small neighbourhood of Voungou, on the family plot where young Michel lives with Maman Pauline and Papa Roger, life goes on. But Michel's everyday cares - lost grocery money, the whims of his parents' moods, their neighbours' squabbling, his endless daydreaming - are soon swept away by the wind of history. In March 1977, just before the arrival of the short rainy season, Comrade President Marien Ngouabi is brutally murdered in Brazzaville, and not even naïve Michel can remain untouched.
Starting as a tender, wry portrait of an ordinary Congolese family, Alain Mabanckou quickly expands the scope of his story into a powerful examination of colonialism, decolonization and dead ends of the African continent. At a stroke Michel learns the realities of life - and how much must change for everything to stay the same.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Congo-born French writer Mabanckou's intimate tale (after Broken Glass) chronicles the days following the assassination of the Republic of Congo's Communist leader Marien Ngouabi in 1977. The 13-year-old narrator, Michel, is a book-smart kid who ruminates on everything except the present and has a keen if simplistic sense of right and wrong. Michel's mundane narration belies the gravity of the story's context, and when he hears of Ngouabi's killing, his dreamy demeanor is barely punctured by reality (even after learning that his uncle was also killed in the coup) and he becomes a distorted cipher for the conventional wisdom of how best to behave amid the unrest ("people say that anyone seen crying a lot will be in favor with the Military Committee, of the Party, while people who don't cry at all will have big problems"). While wearing a black mourning band and a shirt with Ngouabi's face on it, Michel is laughed at by passing soldiers and barely understands why the newly emboldened military would find his outfit funny. Despite the sharp sense of irony, Mabanckou's narrow focus on Michel's point of view obscures the narrative big picture; to appreciate it, readers will need to come prepared with a grasp on the Congo's history. In the end, this feels underdeveloped.
