Je suis né huit fois

Massyre is the eighth child and only son of his family, watched in silence by his seven sisters, and he grows up by the Montagne Blanche, a place every conqueror of Tunisia has prized. He works eight trades: following goats to the slaughterhouse, digging for snails, selling wild fruit, water, fizzy drinks, newspapers by the kilo and second-hand clothes. All the while he goes to school, then university, discovers history, and returns to teach at the lycée of his home region, where he must ask whether one can teach the past in the very place of one's own story.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Length

327 pages in the original

Genres

Coming of age (assigned by AI)

Set in

Tunisia

First published

2013 by Éditions du Seuil

Author's age

42 when first published

ISBN

9782021099706 (original)