Description

A powerful, unsettling, universal novel about love and identity

“As far back as I remember, I was never taught to love. Truth be told, things haven’t really progressed since.”

So begins the nameless protagonist’s journal. An anthropologist from Senegal, thirty-three years of age (half of which spent in France), he doesn’t know how to love, or who to be.

Various encounters draw him out of self-imposed isolation, but his emotional journey is chaotic and marked by an inability to open up to others. Questions of identity plague him, torn as he is between feeling French or Senegalese, and trapped in a paradoxical work routine that consists of researching an Africa whose codes he no longer understands.

By turn cynical, melancholic, tender and euphoric, Black Male is a reflection on racism and de-colonisation, and a vibrant, incisive narrative that takes us right inside the life of an immigrant in search of simple happiness, love, and freedom.

Publisher Review

“Elgas brilliantly reinvents the coming-of-age novel.” * Le Monde * “Elgas presents a narrator whose romantic journey is as convoluted as his identity struggles. A sharp and self-deprecating look at societal issues.” * Jeune Afrique * “In language veering from the explicit to sudden tenderness, Elgas captures us by narrating the search for love of a young man who doesn’t yet know how to love himself.” * Corriere della Sera * “A novel that investigates the dynamics of eroticism and integration and attempts to defuse prejudices and stereotypes.” * Amica *