Guest of the ilb 2002
If a biography can produce a sense of a patchwork identity
then it is the one of Sandrine Bessora van Nguema, better known under
her artistic name of Bessora.
She was born in 1968 in Belgium, her father came from Gabon, her mother
from Switzerland. She grew up in Africa, Europe and the USA. She gained
her first degree in Switzerland and is presently living in Paris, where
she is working on a dissertation in anthropology.
After her first two books, Bessora had already made a name for herself
internationally. Both books appeared with "Le Serpent à Plumes", the
Parisian publisher which possesses some of the most exciting new
voices in literature amongst its authors. Alongside Bessora, books
have also appeared here by Alain Patrice Nganang, Alain Mabanckou and
other young writers who reflect the heritage and the products of the
French colonial history through reaching for drastic measures in
language. A liking has been acquired for her not only in France where,
alongside Calixthe Beyala, who comes from Cameroon, she influences the
picture of the quite glamorous African female writers, but also in the
USA. Her novels already belong to the reading curriculum at
universities because of this influence.
Bessora's stories aren't just well spiced, they're hot. In her debut
novel "53 cm" (1999) the measurement in the title is the size
of the rear of the protagonist, a young mother who immigrated to France
and is looking for a residence permit. The author writes with this
satire, in which she attacks a society which has lost any sense of
orientation and proves itself as completely over-challenged with the
integration of immigrants, in the burlesque tradition of Alfred Jarry
and Raymond Queneau. With this, as is usual in satires, the background
is a more serious one: the racism of bureaucracies and a large measure
of intolerance. "Gallologie" is what Bessora ironically calls this
form of literary research: the knowledge of the nature of the Gauls.
Her second novel is also spicy, "Les taches d'encre" which was
published only one year later: "10.00 pm: Bianca pees but can�t manage
a shit. 10.27 pm: still nothing, despite a glycerine suppository. 10.28
pm: Bianca flushes. 'It's not so bad,', she thinks, 'then I'll just
take a fuca and shit tomorrow morning.'" The vulgarity of the style
doesn't forget the social critique, even here. Bessora follows the
chosen path in her burlesque critique on racism and is not afraid of
declaring the legendary colonialism theorist and critic, Frantz Fanon,
as one of her spiritual fathers - in which she names a fish after him
in the novel. She often interrupts the plot to challenge the reader, in
the style of TV advertizing, not to close the book.
In April 2002, Bessora received the "Prix Fénéon" for "Les Taches
d'encre", which is placed somewhere between a thriller and a
neo-realism novel. Her novel „Cueillez-moi jolis Messieurs“ (2007) was
awarded the Grand Prix littéraire de l’Afrique noire 2007.
Dirk Naguschewski
© internationales literaturfestival berlin | 
ilb.jpg)