The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana
Born in Guadeloupe, Ivan and Ivana are twins with a bond so strong they become afraid of their feelings for one another.
When their mother sends them off to live with their father in Mali they begin to grow apart, until, as young adults in Paris, Ivana's youthful altruism compels her to join the police academy, while Ivan, stunted by early experiences of rejection and exploitation, walks the path of radicalization. The twins, unable to live either with or without each other, become perpetrator and victim in a wave of violent attacks.
In The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana, Maryse Condé, winner of the 2018 Alternative Nobel prize in literature, touches upon major contemporary issues such as racism, terrorism, political corruption, economic inequality, globalization, and migration. With her most modern novel to date, this master storyteller offers an impressive picture of a colorful yet turbulent 21st century.
'Scandal is at the
center of two of Condé's newly translated novels, both of which show her at her
signature best: offering complex, polyphonic and ultimately shattering stories
whose provocations linger long after their final pages.The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana, one of many works wryly rendered in English by
Condé's translator husband, was written in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo
attacks in Paris and takes on the feedback loop of global inequity and
radicalisation. The conceit is deceptively straightforward: Ivan and Ivana are
twins born to a single Guadeloupean mother, and as they grow up they adore each
other above all else in the world. In fact, their bond is so strong that it
tips over into incestuous passions they must be vigilant not to consummate. Yet
despite their closeness, they grow to be as different as night and day, or in
their case, terrorist and police hero...This book is a reflection on the dangers of
binary thinking, and the Wilde line 'Each man kills the thing he loves' serves
as a kind of refrain for the mutually destructive passions between West and
East, black and white, purist and pervert.' — The New York Times Book Review
'What an astounding novel. Never have I read anything so wild and loving, so tender and ruthless. Condé is one of our greatest writers, a literary sorcerer but here she has outdone even herself, summoned a storm from out of the world's troubled heart. Ivan and Ivana, in their love, in their Attic fates, mirror our species' terrible brokenness and it's improbable grace.' — Junot Díaz
'The breadth, depth, and power of Maryse Condé's majestic work is exceptionally remarkable. The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana is a superb addition to this incomparable oeuvre, and is one of Condé's most timely, virtuoso, and breathtaking novels.' — Edwidge Danticat
Maryse Condé was born in Guadeloupe in 1937 as the youngest of eight siblings. She earned her MA and PhD in Comparative Literature at Paris-Sorbonne University and went on to have a distinguished academic career, receiving the title of Professor Emerita of French at Columbia University in New York, where she taught and lived for many years. She has also lived in various West African countries, most notably in Mali, where she gained inspiration for her worldwide bestseller Segu, for which she was awarded the African Literature Prize and several other respected French awards. Condé was awarded the 2018 New Academy Prize (or “Alternative Nobel”) in Literature as well as the 2021 Prix Mondial Cino del Duca for her oeuvre. She also received the Grand-Croix de l’Ordre national du Mérite from President Emmanuel Macron in 2020.
Richard Philcox, based in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region in France, is Maryse Condé’s husband and translator. He has also published new translations of Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth and Black Skin, White Masks. He has taught translation on various American campuses and won grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts for the translation of Condé’s works.
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