Rwanda before
To begin with, it is impossible not to mention Alexis Kagame (1921-1982) who is a priest, poet, sociologist and philosopher. He wrote, for example, Sit down so that I can unbother you (1947), The Source of Progress (1949), Where you have spent the day, no boredom (1949)... He is the greatest historian that Rwanda has ever known. J. Saverio Naigiziki (1915-1984) wrote an autobiographical account, Escapade rwandaise, and a novel, L'Optimiste, which tells the story of a marriage between a Hutu and a Tutsi. Finally, there is the poet Jean-Baptiste Mutabaruka, who published Feuilles de mai and Chants du tam-tam in the 1960s.
Writing for the sake of memory
Since 1998, African novelists have taken up their pens to evoke the extermination of the Tutsis. Like the literature of the Shoah, this mode of writing is a kind of duty of memory, a catharsis. Several of them have come together in a pan-African collective. It was the Chadian Nocky Djedanoum (founder of the Fest'Africa festival) who brought together ten writers for this writing project called "Rwanda: writing as a duty to remember": Koulsy Lamjo, Boubacar Boris Diop, Meja Mwangi, Monique Ilboudo, Vénuste Kayimahé, Véronique Tadjo, Jean-Marie Vianney Rurangwa, Abdourahman Ali Waberi and Nocky Djedanoum. Three novels, born of this project, have emerged to offer the world, through words, the resonance of this ignominy. To begin with, there is L'Aîné des orphelins (The Elder of the Orphans ) by Tierno Monenembo (a French-speaking Guinean writer born in 1947), which received the Tropiques prize, La Phalène des collines (The Phalene of the Hills ) by the Chadian Koulsy Lamko, and Murambi, le livre des ossements (Murambi, the Book of Bones ) by Boubacar Boris Diop, a Senegalese born in 1946, which was awarded the Grand Prix littéraire d'Afrique noire (Black Africa's literary prize). All three have been able to draw on the testimonies of the survivors to create a chillingly true fiction, each in their own way, each with their own writing style and sensitivity.
Rwandan feathers
In the mid-2000s, Rwandan writers decided to take up their pens and tell the story of the genocide. While they were all heirs to the oral literary tradition, some decided to put this abominable extermination into writing, so that the memory would live on. Benjamin Sehene (b. 1959) is the first to evoke the genocide in fiction. Le Feu sous la soutane (2005) is based on the true story of a Hutu priest who welcomed refugees into his church, only to rape the women and take part in the massacre.
Then there's Scholastique Mukasonga. Born in 1956, she arrived in France in 1992. Many members of her family were exterminated during the genocide. In 2006, she published her autobiography Inyenzi ou les Cafards. Since then, other novels have been published: La Femme aux pieds nus (Gallimard, 2008) is a tribute to her mother, L'Iguifou (Gallimard, 2010), Notre-Dame du Nil (Gallimard, 2012), Ce que murmurent les collines (Gallimard, 2014)... She has won numerous awards. Then there's Beata Umibeyi Malresse, born in 1979 in Rwanda. A survivor of the genocide, she arrived in France in 1994, where she pursued brilliant studies. In 2015, she published her first collection of short stories, Ejo, in which she recounts the pre- and post-genocide through the voices of women. She continued on the same theme with Lézardes, her second collection published in 2017. Her first novel sees the light of day in 2019: Tous tes enfants dispersés paints the story of a family spanning three generations, between Rwanda and France.
Esther Mujawayo (b. 1958) is co-founder of an association of genocide widows. Alongside her various professional activities, she has written two books in the spirit of oral narration: Survivantes and La Fleur de Stéphanie. The first is a kind of autobiography, as the author recounts her childhood and life in Rwanda. It includes an interview with Simone Veil, who also experienced the horror of genocide.
Then there's Annick Kayitesi (b. 1979), who also experienced horror: the death of her father and sister in a fire, the murder of her mother, the abduction of her sister and brother, and her enslavement. When her sister was found, they took refuge in France. Annick did brilliantly in her studies and, in 2004, founded the association Études sans frontières, whose aim is to send genocide orphans to school. That same year, she published Nous existons encore(Michel Lafon Editions), a deeply moving account of a young girl's happy childhood, when her life is turned upside down by horror. In 2017, she published Même Dieu ne veut pas s'mêler, a singular work combining collective drama and intimate writing. This resilient survivor of the unthinkable was crowned International Golden Woman in 2004. She continues to fight to ensure that this tragedy is not forgotten.
Finally, let's mention Génocidé (2006) by Révérien Rurangwa (b. 1978), as well as La mort ne veut pas de moi and N'aie pas peur de savoir by Yolande Mukagasana, both survivors of the genocide.
Some French authors
French authors have also taken up the pen to talk about Rwanda. Yoan Smadja is one of them. He is the author of a book published for the twenty-fifth anniversary of the genocide: J'ai cru qu'ils enlevaient toute trace de toi. He built the thread of his story through the testimonies of survivors. Being Jewish, he decided to look at another massacre, another Shoah. There is also Gaël Faye, born in 1982 to a French father and a Rwandan mother, who published Petit pays (2016) in 2016, awarded the Prix Goncourt des lycéens. Let's finish with the French journalist and writer Jean Hatzfeld (born 1949). After the genocide, he was a reporter in Rwanda and worked for several years with survivors. In 2003, he published Une saison de machettes (awarded the Prix Femina essai), and in 2007 La Stratégie des antilopes (The Strategy of the Antelopes ), which received the Prix Médicis. These two works are devoted to the massacres of the Tutsis and are classics in the field.
