Blaise Ndala, born in 1972 in the Democratic Republic of Congo, studied law in Belgium before settling in Canada in 2007. He published two acclaimed novels there, “I will dance on the tomb of Senghor” ( L’Interligne, 2014, Ottawa Book Prize), and “Without a condom or Kalashnikov” (Mémoire d’encrier, 2017, winner of the Combat national des livres de Radio-Canada and the AAOF prize). His third novel “In the Belly of the Congo” received the Ivoire Prize for French-speaking African literature, the Kourouma 2021 Prize and the “Cheikh Hamidou Kane” International Literature Prize.
“ April 1958. When the Universal Exhibition in Brussels opened, Robert Dumont, one of those responsible for the biggest international event since the end of the Second World War, ended up laying down his arms in the face of pressure from the royal palace: he There will indeed be a “Congolese village” in one of the seven pavilions dedicated to the colonies. Among the eleven recruits mobilized at the foot of the Atomium to put on a show is the young Tshala, daughter of the intractable king of the Bakuba. The journey of this princess is revealed to us, from her native Kasai to Brussels via Léopoldville, until her forced exhibition at Expo 58, where we lose track of her.
Summer 2004. Freshly arrived in Belgium, a niece of the missing princess crosses paths with a man haunted by the ghost of her father. This is Francis Dumont, professor of law at the Free University of Brussels. A succession of events ends up revealing to them the secret taken to his grave by the former deputy commissioner of Expo 58. From one century to the next, the novel embraces great History to pose the central question of the equation colonial: can the past pass? » (Presentation of Editions du Seuil)