JOYEUX ANNIVERSAIRE, SONY LABOU'TANSI
born July 5, 1947
Sony Labou'tansi
SONY LABOU'TANSI’s story is singular. Born in Belgian Congo, he learned French at 12 when he moved to Brazzaville, the French portion of Congo, and suffered outrageous humiliations because he spoke kikongo and couldn’t speak French at first.
Labou'tansi became a prolific poet and novelist, if not the most prolific African author to date, a humane playwright, a Congolese congressman, and an English teacher. While the French literary milieu acclaimed Labou’tansi for his rabelaisian prose and artistic genius, the author was critical of the French establishment in their former African colonies, especially in Congo-Brazzaville.
A literary giant and a universal political conscience, Labou'tansi fought obscurantism and mediocrity in literature, the arts, and life in general.
For him, writing is not a martyr, rather an act of love and words are corpses until the writer breathes life into them through narration.
Sony, you are sorely missed, but as the voice of a master falls silent, his work becomes eternal: Mbutuku kia mboté, Happy Birthday, Brother-poet!
SONY LABOU'TANSI: "WHY I WRITE" (IN FRENCH)
