The Living Days - Softcover

Ananda Devi; Jeffrey Zuckerman

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1999331842 ISBN 13: 9781999331849

Publisher: Les Fugitives, 2020

Synopsis

'Beautifully written, visceral and ecstatic. Unafraid, as Angels might be, to bear witness to the force of entropy pulling us all towards death' -Preti Taneja, author of 'We That Are Young'

A chance encounter on Portobello Road incites an unsettling, magnetic attraction between Mary, an elderly white woman, and Cub, a British-Jamaican boy, and drives her crumbling world into heightened delusion. The two struggle to keep their footing as white supremacy, desperation and class conflict collide on the streets of London. Through exquisite juxtaposition, Ananda Devi exposes the tensions of an increasingly nationalistic and polarised metropolis. At once realistic and fantastical, The Living Days encapsulates Devi's daring, unflinching talent and paints an unforgettable portrait of London at it's most bewitching, and most dangerous.

'Prompts a meditation on urban inequality, in which the politics of race and class loom large.' -The Guardian

'Devi is alert to the ways in which social forces, such as racism and ageism, are reshaping London s already complex post-colonial landscape, and her fluid, poetic language memorably conjures a union of two outcasts.'- The New Yorker

'This is a novel of great beauty as well as discomfiting disclosure. Ananda Devi's writing challenges us to reconfigure our own beliefs about right and wrong and to look beyond our own comfortable lives to consider the reality of others.'- Jo Lateu, New Internationalist

About this title

About the Author

Born in Mauritius, Ananda Devi is a multi-award winning novelist, short-story writer and poet. Translated into a dozen languages, she is considered a powerful voice in modern African writing in French. Winner of the 2024 Neustadt International Prize for Literature for the entirety of her work, she holds a PhD in social anthropology from SOAS, London, where she lived for several years. She has also lived in Congo-Brazzaville and currently resides in Ferney-Voltaire, France.

In 2023 she won the Grand Prix de l'Héroïne Madame Figaro for Sylvia P., a long form essay on American poet Sylvia Plath; the Prix Étonnants Voyageurs for her novel Manger l’autre (2018). In 2015, she was featured at the PEN World Voices Festival in New York. In 2014, she was awarded the Prix du Rayonnement de la langue et de la littérature françaises by the Académie Française. She won the Prix Mokanda (2012). She was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 2010 and won the Prix des Cinq Continents de la Francophonie (2006) for Ève de ses décombres, published in English as Eve out of Her Ruins (2016).

Edition details

• Publisher: Les Fugitives
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1999331842
• ISBN 13: 9781999331849
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 174
• Editor: Cecile Menon