Auteur : Elara Bertho

Journal : Mande Studies

Throughout his life Djibril Tamsir Niane never stopped rewriting Soundjata’s story, both in his historical research texts and in his literary accounts. This hesitation between history and literature on the scale of a life and work that marked Guinea, and provided a hero to a large part of the continent since Soundjata acquired a pan-African aura, constitutes a moment in African history. One can decide to read it as an incoherence, a freedom taken with history. However, this dual career as a novelist and historian in the service of “the African people,” as the title of his latest work indicates, illustrates fifty years of uses of history in which the historian is a craftsman whose work must have a social utility. Through the study of these different texts, I propose analyzing the place of the figure of Soundjata according to Niane in Guinea, but above all the place of this intellectual figure, whose political commitment is intensely linked to his academic commitment. I also question the place of his informants and sources in the making of history.

Axes thématiques : Transculturalités

Mots-clés : Littérature

Mis à jour le 01/01/2021