- Published: 07/01/2000
- ISBN: 9781862073135
- Granta Books
- 208 pages
From the Same Author
Texaco
Patrick Chamoiseau, translated by Rose-Myriam Rejouis,Val Vinokurov
‘One of the major fictional achievements of our century’ The Times
On the edge of Fort de France, the capital of Martinique, squats a shanty town. It goes by the name of Texaco.
One dawn, a stranger arrives – an urban planner, bearing news. Texaco is to be razed to the ground. And so he is lead to Marie-Sophie Laborieux, the ancient keeper of Texaco’s history, who invites her guest to take a seat and begins the true story of all that is to be lost.
Texaco is a creole masterpiece. Told in a newly forged language, it is a riotous collage of indigenous Caribbean and colonial European influences; a kaleidoscopic epic of slavery and revolution, superstition and imagination; a story of human deceits and desires played out to the backdrop of uncontrollable, all powerful History. First published in 1992, it was awarded France’s highest literary award, the Prix Goncourt, and remains an unequivocal classic of Caribbean literature.
Patrick Chamoiseau on Granta.com
Fiction | The Online Edition
The Rat
Patrick Chamoiseau
‘Fort-de-France, at that time, had not yet declared war on rats. Along with the crabs, they inhabited the crumbled sidewalks and canals of the city. ’