LITBITS
Here are small bits of literary news...
100th Anniversary of James Joyce's Ulysses
To celebrate a hundred years since Sylvia Beach published James Joyce's ULYSSES, and to encourage readers to engage (or re-engage) with this spirited, funny, life-changing book, Shakespeare and Company, Paris—in partnership with Penguin Classics and Hay Festival—has created an ensemble recording of the unabridged text, to be released as a free podcast between the centenary of the publication on 2nd February 2022 and Bloomsday on June 16 2022. Click here for more information. And read the article in The Guardian.
"Evening With an Author" at the American Library in Paris. You can attend online and in person. Click on the links below to reserve. For the full calendar, click here.
1.
When: February 1 @ 19h30 - 20h30
What: From Slavery to Black Lives Matter with Pap Ndiaye
In March 2021, many news outlets from Le Monde to the New York Times reported on a historic moment: Pap Ndiaye, a French historian specializing in African American and Afro-French history, had been appointed director of the National Museum of the History of Immigration in Paris. Built in 1931 to celebrate French colonialism, the museum has a troubled historical identity which Ndiaye seeks to expose and transform.
2.
When: February 2 @ 19h30 - 20h30
What: What Really Troubles the 99% with Albena Azmanova
A daring and unapologetic intervention in post-2008 financial crisis leftism, Albena Azmanova's Capitalism on the Edge offers a radical alternative to traditional anti-capitalist narratives which place inequality at the center of their critiques. Azmanova claims rather that the central contradiction of the modern age is the emergence of "precarity capitalism": on one side, ceaseless pursuit of profit on a corporate level; on the other, a labor force living in constant financial insecurity. It is this perennial state of anxiety which fosters social and political division; and it is by way of political alliance and social policy aimed at developing trust that we can overcome it.
3.
When: February 8 @ 19h30 - 20h30
What: We Are Bridges with Cassandra Lane
In 1904, Cassandra Lane's great-grandfather was lynched by white men in a small town in Louisiana. Over one hundred years later, Lane, pregnant with her first child, begins to reflect on what it means to inherit and transmit a family history. We Are Bridges, Lane's debut novel, is the product of such reflection: a work which intertwines past and present, pain and love, as well as documented and imagined histories. Piecing together her ancestors' lives before, during, and in the aftermath of her great-grandfather's murder, Lane uses moving language and evocative questions to guide the reader through a personal epic of intergenerational trauma, collective memory, creation stories, speech, silence, and the enduring marks of racial violence.
4.
When: February 9 @ 19h30 - 20h30
What: Myth of a Colorblind France
The term 'colorblind' is complicated and frequently ambiguous, carrying with it both negative and positive connotations. Historically, France has been celebrated for its colorblind ethos, which favors equality over difference. However, recent discussions have highlighted the ways the colorblind approach ignores socio-political structures and undervalues the particularities of the Black experience. Alan Govenar's documentary, Myth of a Colorblind France, arrives at a pertinent moment in this debate. Detailing both historical African American artists who saw France as a place of refuge from American racism, and the experience of immigrants and people of color in present-day France, Govenar offers a rich picture of Black history in France while also criticizing oversimplified narratives depicting France as a racial utopia.
Ultimately, the film invites us to reflect on the nature of myth: what myth is, how it can be put to use, and how we can simultaneously find truth and falsity in it. From figures such as Josephine Baker, James Baldwin, and Richard Wright, to contemporary artists such as musician Karim Toure, Govenar's tone is neither naïve nor damning, but rather celebratory of Black life and art.
