Alain Mabanckou

Katelyn Knox (University of California, Los Angeles)

Ed. by Nicki Hitchcott, University of Nottingham
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 8.2.1: Francophone African Writing and Culture: Subsaharan.
Vol. editors: Helen Rachel Cousins (Birmingham Newman University)

Dates

Born 24 Feb 1966
Activity 1998-ongoing

Places

Born in Republic of the Congo
Active in United States; France; Republic of the Congo

Activities

Primary

Literary Critic/ Historian
Novelist
Poet
Scholar

Resources

Mabanckou's Works

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As the title to his book-length essay

Écrivain et oiseau migrateur

(2011) [

Writer and Migratory Bird

] signals, Alain Mabanckou’s travel experiences—from the fictional journeys he took through the literary works that fascinated him as a child, to those that led him from the Congo to France to the United States as he pursued his studies and literary career—have simultaneously allowed him to gain critical distance on his own culture, and prompted him to reflect on questions of belonging, cultural circulation, history, and identity. Born in 1966 in the Republic of the Congo (which he often refers to as “the little Congo”, lest any interlocutor confuse it with its larger neighbour, the Democratic Republic of the Congo), Mabanckou grew up in Pointe Noire as an only child. His mother…

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3345 words

Citation: Knox, Katelyn. "Alain Mabanckou". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 15 April 2013 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=13170, accessed 24 November 2024.]