BOLYA : The polyandrous (La polyandre)

The novelist Bolya Baenga passed away a little over a year ago. I promised myself to discover his work with some titles that have an explosive character "Cannibal", "The polyandrous," "The Desecration of vaginas" to name only novels. I like to think the best tribute we can pay to an author is to discover his work because, somehow, it is a way to introduce him into immortality as the reader continues to interact with the writer whom disappeared. Bolya won the Grand prix littéraire d'Afrique noire (Major literary prize of Black Africa) in 1986 for his novel Cannibal.

I try to be as honest in my reading comments, and I think that describing the conditions of reading is as important as to mention the characters, the plot, and the significance or not of the text. I myself have had great difficulty in entering the atmosphere of The Polyandrous novel published in 1998 by Serpent Noir (Black Snake). Reading interspersed with other readings in which I immersed more easily with less detonating stories, if you allow me that expression of Bolya’s novel.

History

Three corpses of blacks, of Negros in Bolya’s own words, are discovered at the Place de la Bastille. Naked. Mutilated. Emasculated. The subject makes headlines. What has happened? Should we talk about hate crimes in France that look like the 80s? Among those that the inspector Negro - whom bears his name well, even if he is whiter than porcelain - questions, there are Ouleymatou, a beautiful African lady followed closely by a people journalist, the aptly named Gruff, ready to do anything to get the breaking news that will propel his career and whom pays particular attention to the African rump. The beautiful Ouleymatou turns out to be the daughter of a polyandrous princess and perpetuates her family and cultural heritage in France. As a reminder, polyandry is this marriage system where a woman is allowed to contract marriages with several males.

Bolya offers readers an insight into a world where morals are the antithesis of a Western and even African concept of marriage; A world of undocumented African hunted by a coarse and discourteous police. It is quite difficult to follow the Congolese novelist in the portrait he made of Ouleymatou in her disconnected customs. The subject is certainly interesting and polyandry is a subject in itself particularly crisp. One has the feeling that there is a discourse reflecting a particularly ironic look and a voluntary caricature by the Congolese writer of a clandestine "Negro" community, often located in the 12th arrondissement (city division) of Paris on which he pours the most anticipated shots in the fashion black micmac (badass), with the icing on the cake being polyandry in which he wears a tasty analysis and asks the reader to make an attempt of imagining the scenario. The real matriarchal power that Ouleymatou and her clique of polyandrous belonging to ethnic "abisi" or "lele" discreetly exercise with authority raises desires and disappointments for those most on edge surrounding the beautiful princess.

This novel, which let us say is a bad thriller, is especially successful for the exercise of the mind that offers Bolya; A savate shot (kung-fu blow) carefully placed in the dominant patriarchal system; A reversal of the grand scales, a fictional striking design on the role of women in our societies. I think it is primarily the message of the first novel written simply enough.

Happy reading,

Bolya, La Polyandre

Le serpent à plumes Editions, Collection Le Serpent noir. First published in 1998, 234 pages
Crédit Photo Elise Fitte-Duval 

Article original traduit du français par Dinam T. Bigny

Honore de Balzac : Sur Catherine de Medicis

Every time I walk near the Temple of the Oratory of the Louvre, I admit to have a small pinching out in front of the discreet statue of the Admiral Gaspard de Coligny. Oh! It is not both in front of this major figure of the Protestantism of the 16th century, murdered during the famous massacre of Saint-Barthélemy, that I am moved. Even if, somewhere, we share a similar Protestant faith.
No, in passing in front of this testimony of the violent story of France, I cannot refrain by thinking that the story belongs certainly to the winners. There is no thing new under the sun as would say the Ecclesiastes. Coligny, 5 centuries after his murder stays a hidden character whose tourist would have difficulty to notice the presence behind the bars of an eternal captivity. The religious wars, the pacification during the Henri IV reign, then the revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV erased the tracks of a reformation which disturb this big country during almost two centuries. Although Cevennes are still marked by this historic Protestant presence.

You will have certainly understood this, I like the history in general and it is true that I was always fascinated by the history of Saint Barthélemy. Go to know why. But when I was a teenager I love Dumas and his musketeers. I had nevertheless no occasion to deepen the question. I thus stayed on this idea of Catherine de Médicis influencing her son, Charles IX king of France.

So, when I find this historical novel of Balzac dealing with the character of this queen of France come from Florence, I was delighted at the idea to kill two birds with one store: Firstly make a deep research of the history and then approach my first text of Balzac. I was not disappointed.

It is necessary to notice that the back cover of this paperback announced an extremely aggressive point of view and the legal action of Médecis. This approach is politically incorrect, by making wear to the Queen mother a coat soiled by blood.

I must say it; this reading was fascinating, rich and it carried by a high writing. The author mentioned the various actors of several decades of fight for the power under several reformations.

If Catherine de Médicis is in the center of this story, the context in which she evolves is dissected with accuracy: the intrigues of the house of the Way, the catholic leaders on several generations, the expectations of the kingdom of Navarre embodying the younger royal branch said Bourbons and the middle class, the occult advisers, the foreign queens, the common law wife.

Catherine de Médicis is an outstanding woman. Ambitious and woman of power was dedicated to the black arts, deprived of influence during the reign of her husband Henri II for the benefit of his common law wife, Diane de Poitiers, she is going to wait for the advent of her children in order to steer the country at war.

There is something extremely moving but also shocking. It was to notice that the reasons of state seemed to prevail over the life of her offspring.
The various interests of that period were examined by the 19 century author.

If the reformation impact is deep in the French society, in particular in the denunciation of the Roman Catholic Church, Balzac convinced that it remains a tool in the hands of belligerent in order to allow them to weigh in the fight of power which seems to escape to the Valois.

The portrait which he is raising of Jean Calvin is also rather surprising. According to him, Robespierre and Calvin: the same fight, the same initiative, the same madness? In spite of the modesty of the protesting in opposition with the excesses of the Roman, the man under the feather of Balzac one of his characters in search of the absolute power. This point of view must be developed.

The tempestuous episodes of this period both in Florence and in France are approached - even if Saint Barthélemy is finally evoked by fragments.
It is a good text.

Honore de Balzac - Sur Catherine de Medicis

Gangoueus and Moon Deley