Lit in Translation

Our Lady of the Nile

Notre-Dame du Nil

Scholastique Mukasonga (born 1956)

Translated by Melanie Mauthner

English editions

In English

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High in the Rwandan mountains, close to where the Nile begins, stands a Catholic boarding school for girls whose parents want them kept untouched until suitable husbands are found; by rule only one pupil in ten may be Tutsi. Nearby lives an old European painter, obsessed with the theory that the Tutsi are heirs of ancient Egypt, who paints the Tutsi students as goddesses and so puts them in danger. Inside the school, friendships, jealousies and ambitions mix with politics, as Hutu extremists close in and harassment turns into open violence, foreshadowing the genocide.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form
Novel
Length
222 pages in the original
Genres
Politics, Coming of age (assigned by AI)
Set in
Rwanda
First published
2012 by Gallimard
Author's age
56 when first published
ISBN

9782070133420 (original)

9780914671039 (Archipelago Books, United States)

9781911547884 (Daunt Books, United Kingdom)

More
Wikidata