Kossi Efoui was born in 1962 in Togo. His participation in the student movement of the 1980s, harshly repressed by the regime of General Eyadéma, led him to prison and torture. It is writing that saves him, and allows him to find refuge in France. Because staying in Togo meant risking one’s life. So the maternal injunction, without appeal: “Go live. Go live somewhere else and never come back”.
In his new highly autobiographical novel, ordinary magic, Kossi Efoui recounts his country, his past, and above all his mother, an essential figure in his life, his thought, even his writing. Because as a child, the school forced him to speak French and forbade him to use Ewe, his mother tongue. But when he gets home, his mother asks him: “So, what did you learn in the school language?” ». And Kossi tells, learns to translate, to think in his mother tongue, which will have a profound influence on his writing.
RFI Archive :
In 1990, Kossi Efoui won the Grand Prix of the inter-African theatrical competition, the ancestor of the RFI-Théâtre Prize, with his play Crossroads. An inspired “prompter” features three actors: a street woman, a poet in revolt and a peacekeeper. These characters are the projections of the memories of a man stuck in a prison. And the mental escape he attempts is not really one: circular navigation at the same crossroads of images. Reflections of 20 years spent in the shadow of authoritarianism. Its radio adaptation is to (re) discover!
The crossroads (Kossi Efoui, Togo 1990)