Who is Maylis de Kerangal?
If fiction in translation is up your street, you must have read (about) Maylis de Karengal. Her epic yet intimate prose, brilliantly translated into English by Jessica Moore, have seduced readers on both sides of the Channel. According to British writer Jonathan Coe (whom she will meet at the French Institute next Friday : book your tickets here!), she is "one of the most original and exciting writers to have come to France in the last few years".
What is her story?
She spent her childhood in Le Havre, France. She studied Humanities in Rouen and moved to Paris to specialise in history, philosophy and ethnology. Before being an author, she worked for the French publishing house Gallimard - as an editor for children's literature, and created her own house, Le Baron Perché.
What are her novels?
Her first novel, Je marche sous un ciel de traîne, was published in 2000, followed by La Vie voyageuse in 2003, Ni fleurs ni couronnes in 2006, Dans les rapides in 2007 and Corniche Kennedy in 2008. The latter was shortlisted for a number of literary prizes.
But the novel that first made her famous is Birth of a Bridge, published in 2010, winner of the Prix Franz Hessel and Prix Médicis. It is also her first to have been translated into English by Jessica Moore, and published by Maclehose Press.
"Coca, Southern California. A small town on a wild river, at the margins of the red-rocked desert and the forest where the last of the state's Native Americans still make their home.When Boa, the charismatic new mayor, decides to put Coca on the map, he plans a monumental new project: a six-lane bridge, two hundred metres high, designed and destined to catapult the city into the third millennium.Workers from across the globe flock to California: to earn a living, to escape their pasts, to bear witness to man's mastery of nature. But the project's majestic scope has no regard for the legacy of this ancient land, and within this monochrome Babel festers a very human cocktail of fears and passions. At once timeless and yet exquisitely of its moment, Maylis De Kerangal's multi-award-winning novel follows its broad cast of construction workers and architects, diggers and dreamers, as they navigate both the intricacies of their project and the depths of the human heart."
In 2014, her novel Mend the Living was released to wide acclaim, winning the Grand Prix RTL-Lire award and the student choice novel of the year from France Culture and Télèrama. Also translated into English by Jessica Morre and published by Maclehose Press, it was longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize this year (read more about it here).
"In the depths of a winter's night, the heart of Simon Limbeau is resting, readying itself for the day to come. In a few hours' time, just before six, his alarm will go off and he will venture into the freezing dawn, drive down to the beach, and go surfing with his friends. A trip he has made a hundred times and yet, today, the heart of Simon Limbeau will encounter a very different course. But for now, the black-box of his body is free to leap, swell, melt and sink, just as it has throughout the years of Simon's young life."
Maylis de Kerangal was at the Institut Français on the 2nd of February 2015 to talk about this breathless account of pulsating life and accidental death. Watch her read an excerpt:
To listen to the podcast of the full discussion, follow this link!