Camara Laye (January 1, 1928 – Arts et Métiers and the École Technique

February 4, 1980) was an African writer d'Aeonautique et de Construction

from Guinea. He was the author of The Automobile, where he received a diploma in
African Child (L'Enfant noir), a novel based engineering. He supported himself as a
loosely on his own childhood, and The porter in Les Halles and at the Simca
Radiance of the King (Le Regard du roi). automobile plant.
Both novels are among the earliest major
works in Francophone African literature. L'Enfant noir and Critical Success
Camara Laye later worked for the
government of newly independent Guinea, L'Enfant noir (1953; Dark Child) is
but went into voluntary exile over political primarily a recounting of Laye's own voyage
from childhood, when he played near his
issues.
father's goldsmith forge, to gifted young
manhood, when he departed for France. The
Family History book wins its audience through its tender but
Laye's family belonged to the unsentimental treatment of the older African
Malinké people, who retained their ancestral life and the dignity and beauty of that
animist religion, despite the region's overall nostalgically lamented past. Laye expresses
his deep anxiety at leaving his homeland,
conversion to Islam several centuries ago.
writing, "It was a terrible parting! I do not
His father, Camara Komady, was a like to think of it. I can still hear my mother
blacksmith and goldsmith and a descendent wailing. It was as if I was being torn apart."
of the Camara clan, which traced its However, this separation enhanced his
genealogy back to the thirteenth century. His appreciation for his home and his culture.
mother, Dâman Sadan, also came from a Shortly before the publication of his first
family of blacksmiths. Although Camara novel, he brought Marie Lorifo, whom he
had known from Conakry, to Paris and
was his family name, he published his work
married her. L'Enfant noir received critical
as Camara Laye, retaining the format used in acclaim and won the Prix Charles Veillon in
Guinean schools. Laye's early childhood February of 1954; the novel was recognized
years were strongly traditional and full of as one of the most important pieces of
happiness; Sonia Lee in Camara Layewrote contemporary prose from French-speaking
that, "For Laye, Africa remained forever the Africa.
Africa of his youth, and he was always to
look upon her with the eyes of the heart." Le Regard du roi Consolidated
Laye's Literary Career
Education in Guinea and France
Laye's second novel, Le Regard du
First studying in Koranic and roi (1954; The Radiance of the King),
French-run schools, Laye went on to study presents the wandering Ishmael of a
technical subjects at the École Poiret in starveling Frenchman adrift in Africa and
forced to work out through suffering a new
Conakry. Laye was fortunate that his father destiny for himself. Clarence, guided by two
allowed him to pursue his education rather jostling, derisive, but still solicitous boys,
than assist him at his forge. In 1947 he won finds a home of sorts as a stud for a tired
a scholarship to France, where he studied master of a large harem. Beginning his trek
motor engineering at Argenteuil and earned in search of a wonderfully wise and rich
his Automobile Mechanic's Certificate. He king, Clarence enters the whirlpool of sloth,
of lust, of despair, until one day the King
decided to remain in Paris after his
arrives and accepts in his open arms the
scholarship had finished and continue his bedraggled but earnest man, no longer full
technical education; although he loved of the unconscious arrogance of the white
literature, he had not yet developed any man. Widely considered Laye's
pretensions of becoming a writer. Laye then masterpiece, Le Regard du roi firmly
attended school at the Conservatoire des
established Laye's reputation as a quality (IFAN), collecting and editing the folktales
writer. and songs of the Malinké people, but his
income was significantly lower than the
Guinean Independence and salary he had received from the Guinean
Government Posts government. In 1970, Laye's wife was
arrested at the airport in Guinea after
Laye and his wife returned to Guinea in receiving a letter from her sick father urging
1956. He worked in several positions in her to visit. Laye was left to raise their seven
West Africa, including teaching French in children, the youngest of whom was only
Accra, Ghana. After Guinea attained its several months old when she left. In 1971
independence in September of 1958, Laye Laye completed a novel entitled L'Exile, but
became Guinea's ambassador to Ghana and deferred its publication because of its
played a key role in procuring aid for his political sensitivity and his wife's
country. He also spent a short time as a confinement in Guinea. During his wife's
diplomat in Liberia; later, he returned to imprisonment, Laye married a second wife
Guinea and held a series of prominent —a custom among some Muslim
positions including director of the denominations—and had another two
Department of Economic Agreements at the children. After his first wife was released in
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and associate 1977, she returned to Dakar, but was unable
director of the National Institute of Research to accept Laye's additional wife. As a result,
and Documentation. the couple divorced.

Increasing Popularity and Acute Illness

Acknowledgment in West Africa
In 1975 Laye became acutely ill with a
kidney condition that had first troubled him
While working for the government, Laye
back in 1965, but he could not afford the
continued to write, completing plays for
treatment in Europe that he needed. Reine
radio and collecting some oral literature of
Carducci, wife of the Italian UNESCO
the Manding. His popularity in West Africa
ambassador to Senegal and an admirer of
grew. He received critical praise in the first
Laye's work, became conscious of Laye's
issue of Black Orpheus in 1957 and was
plight and championed an appeal for
included in Gerald Moore's Seven African
financial support. Félix Houphouët-Boigny,
Writers (1962).
president of the Ivory Coast, made the
largest contribution; Laye later wrote his
Laye Went into Exile biography and expressed his admiration for
the leader. Laye received the necessary
As Guinea's political situation deteriorated, medical care in Paris and returned
Laye voiced his concern. He soon fell into periodically for further treatment.
disfavor and often was close to being under
house arrest. In 1965 he fled with his family Later Works
to Dakar in Senegal. Torn from his beloved
homeland, he would never be able to return.
In 1971 Laye began writing Le Maître de la
Because of his intense distaste for the
parole (1978). Though eschewing
authoritative regime of President Séekou
collaboration with the many exiled enemies
Touré, Laye's third
of Touré, Laye in an interview did not hide
novel, Dramouss (1966; A Dream of Africa),
his debt to Kafka and the surrealists and his
is a bitter, even savage, denunciation of a
intention to mingle fiction and reality into a
regime he envisioned as a nightmare of a
new and greater truth in the effort to express
giant astride the wounded Guinea in which
his own outrage at what had happened to his
he had lived during the 1960s.
homeland. An honest artist and a sensitive
participant in the pains of a postcolonial
Difficult Years in Senegal world, Laye produced works that speak
about the clamor and that are more poignant
Life for Laye and his family in Senegal was because of their intense dream-like style.
not easy. He worked as a research fellow at Eventually, Laye's ill heath caught up with
the Institut Fondamental d'Afrique Noire
him and he died on February 4, 1980, in I can be extra-ordinary
Dakar, where he is buried. call me William Kamkwamba the Inventor;
Give me a library with books
Further Reading on Camara Laye Give me a scrap yard and discarded
electronics
Information on the life and work of Laye is Give me a broken bicycle;
in Gerald Moore, Seven African Plus the freedom to be me
Writers (1962); Claude Wauthier, The And I will build you a wind mill
Literature and Thought of Modern I am an African child
Africa (1964; trans. 1966); Judith Illsley  
Gleason, This Africa: Novels by West We are the new generation
Africans in English and French(1965); Ulli Not afraid to be us
Beier, ed., Introduction to African Uniquely gifted, black and talented
Literature (1967); A. C. Brench, The Shining like the stars we are
Novelists' Inheritance in French We are the children of Africa
Africa (1967); and Wilfred Cartey, Whispers Making the best of us
from a Continent: The Literature of Yes! I am an African child
Contemporary Black Africa (1969); the
chapter by Jeanette Macaulay in Cosmo
Pieterse and Donald Munro, eds., Protest The African Child is a distinct and
and Conflict in African Literature (1969); graceful memoir of Camara Laye's youth in
Adele King, The Writings of Camara the village of Koroussa, French Guinea.
Laye, Heinemann (1980); and Sonia Long regarded Africa's preeminent
Lee, Camara Laye, Twayne Publishers Francophone novelist, Laye (1928-80)
(1984). herein marvels over his mother's
supernatural powers, his father's distinction
as the village goldsmith, and his own
passage into manhood, which is marked by
African Child
animistic beliefs and bloody rituals of
I am an African child
primeval origin. Eventually, he must choose
Born with a skin the colour of chocolate
between this unique place and the academic
Bright, brilliant and articulate
success that lures him to distant cities. More
Strong and bold; I’m gifted
than autobiography of one boy, this is the
Talented enough to be the best
universal story of sacred traditions
I am an African child
struggling against the encroachment of a
 
modern world. A passionate and deeply
Often the target of pity
affecting record, The Dark Child is a classic
My future is not confined to charity
of African literature. This edition was
Give me the gift of a lifetime;
translated by James Kirkup and Ernest
Give me a dream, a door of opportunity;
Jones. It features an introduction from
I will thrive
Philippe Thoby-Marcellin.
I am an African child
  It gives an insider of the typical
Do not hide my fault African Child experiences. From the
show me my wrong superstitious beliefs like when he was told
I am like any other; that a snake was his father’s guiding spirit
Teach me to dream because it had appeared to him in his dream,
And I will become and his Father would therefore stroke this
I am an African child snake whenever he was at work. To the
  mysterious white threads which were tied to
I am the son, daughter of the soil the bombax trees during the circumcision
Rich in texture and content ceremony for the young boys of 12-14 years,
Full of potential for a better tomorrow or was the it the roar of Kondèn Diara which
Teach me discipline, teach me character, roared during the circumcision ceremony
teach me hard work only for them to eventually find out that it
Teach me to think like the star within me wasn’t really a lion roaring, while their
I am an African child foreheads were bent to the ground. But
 
sounds made with small boards, which were
thick at the centre, sharp at the edges with a
hole on one side in which a string is tied to,
such that when the boys swing it round like
a swing, the board cuts through the air and
produced a roaring sound similar to a lion’s
roar. Interesting hey.
But these things were kept secret to them,
till they were older and knew more. That
was the fun of it. The fun was their
innocence of these things which they were
made to believe, and the mystery of the
happenings which they had no
understanding of. For if they understood
these occurrences as young boys, they
would have no stories to tell as adults.

Camara tells us of the senior boys

who bullied them and the way he made his
Father teach them a lesson. The guava tree
litters which they had to pick up as second-
year pupils, but were never allowed to taste
any of the fruit. The leaf-litter was so much,
he could’ve sworn that it was their sole-
purpose: to litter the ground and make their
back breaks while picking them with their
bare hands. Or was it the vicious cows they
had to rear as senior boys? And their
untimely death which awaited them if a
single head went missing from the herd?

He took us on his journey to the

capital, Conakry for his studies and falling
in love with Marie. She was half-caste (bi-
racial), with a very light skin, almost white
and very beautiful like a fairy. And she had
exceptionally long hair which hung down to
her waist. The feeling of belonging and
acceptance which he got from his Uncle’s
family whom he was staying with while
studying in the technical college in Conakry.

Losing a childhood friend to an

unknown disease, and eventually leaving his
family for the second time amidst tears,
pleadings to further pursue his studies in
Paris.
“You won’t leave me alone, tell me won’t
leave me alone” his mother said between
tears when she learnt that he was to leave
again, soon.

Laye wrote about love, dreams,

hope, sorrow, pain, mystery, knowledge,
ignorance, belief, faith and most importantly
the love of family.