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Synopsis
The Swedish Academy, in awarding J.M.G. Le Clzio the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature, praised Desert as Le Clzio's "definitive breakthrough as a novelist." Published in France in 1980, Desert received the Grand Prix Paul Morand from the Acadmie Franaise, was translated into twenty-three languages, and quickly proved to be a best-selling novel in many countries around the world.
Available for the first time in English translation, Desert is a novel composed of two alternating narratives, set in counterpoint. The first takes place in the desert between 1909 and 1912 and evokes the migration of a young adolescent boy, Nour, and his people, the Blue Men, notorious warriors of the desert. Driven from their lands by French colonial soldiers, Nour's tribe has come to the valley of the Saguiet El Hamra to seek the aid of the great spiritual leader known as Water of the Eyes. The religious chief sends them out from the holy city of Smara into the desert to travel still further. Spurred on by thirst, hunger, and suffering, Nour's tribe and others flee northward in the hopes of finding a land that can harbor them at last.
The second narrative relates the contemporary story of Lalla, a descendant of the Blue Men. Though she is an orphan living in a shantytown known as the Project near a coastal city in Morocco, the blood of her proud, obstinate tribe runs in her veins. All too soon, Lalla must flee to escape a forced marriage with an older, wealthy man. She travels to France, undergoing many trials there, from working as a hotel maid to becoming a highly-paid fashion model, and yet she never betrays the blood of her ancestors.
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Review
'A rich, sprawling, searching, poetic, provocative, broadly historic and demanding novel, which in all those ways displays the essence of Le Clézio. As a reflection on colonization and its legacy, it is painfully relevant after 30 years.' --New York Times
'Dense, highly measured, intensely imagistic... A book one must admire for its profound seriousness, for its scorched-earth poetics and for its rendering of a lost world.' --Douglas Kennedy, The Times
'[Le Clezio's] tales have epic and exotic qualities...he writes with a moral seriousness and engagement... These stories of displacement and exile are both timely and epic... This is one of Le Clezio's major works... It reveals the history of colonial France in the Arab world.'
--Andrew Hussey, Financial Times
From the Publisher
The international bestseller, by the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature 2008, available for the first time in English translation.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherDavid R. Godine Publisher Inc
- Publication date2011
- ISBN 10 1567923879
- ISBN 13 9781567923872
- BindingPaperback
- Number of pages352
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Softcover. Condition: Good. Reprint. A masterpiece from J. M. G. Le Clézio, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. The parallel stories of a lost culture in the North African desert and their descendants, unwanted immigrants in Europe.Desert is two stories. The first takes place between 1909 and 1912 and is about the migration of a young adolescent boy, Nour, and his people, the Blue Men. They are warriors of the desert. Driven from their lands by French colonial soldiers, Nours tribe has come to the valley of the Saguiet El Hamra to seek the aid of the great spiritual leader known as Water of the Eyes. The religious chief sends them out from the holy city of Smara into the desert to travel still further. Spurred on by thirst, hunger, and suffering, Nours tribe and others flee northward in the hopes of finding a land that can harbor them at last.The second narrative tells the contemporary story of Lalla, a descendant of the Blue Men. An orphan living in a shantytown known as the Project near a coastal city in Morocco, Lalla must flee to France where even greater challenges await her.This is world literature at its most powerful from a master storyteller. Seller Inventory # SONG1567923879
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