groomed for a political career. The story also highlights the process by which servility or "negraille" (a word coined by Ouologuem) is ingrained in the black population. Other writings Ouologuem's best-known works were republished in English and edited by Christopher Wise in The Yambo Ouologuem Reader: The Duty of Violence, A Black Ghostwriter's Letter to France and The Thousand and One Bibles of Sex (Africa World Press, 2008). His legacy is explored in a contemporary light in Yambo Ouologuem: Postcolonial Writer, Islamic Militant, a 1999 anthology, also edited by Wise, which includes an account of Wise's own attempt to find Ouologuem in Africa. Wise called "Ouologuem's decision to return to Mali and wash his hands of writing in French ... an incalculable loss to world literature." Ouologuem also wrote poetry, some of which appeared in the journal Nouvelle Somme. He is anthologized in Poems of Black Africa (ed. Wole Soyinka, 1975) and The Penguin Book of Modern African Poetry (ed. Gerald Moore and Ulli Beier, 1984). Influence Le devoir de violence has been defended by a number of critics including Kwame Anthony Appiah, who views it as a rejection of the "first generation of modern African novels — the generation of Achebe's Things Fall Apart and Laye's L'Enfant noir". Jean-Frédéric de Hasque's 2009 documentary [ Où est l'Eldorado?] (In Search of Eldorado) sporadically mentions Ouologuem's life and writings. The film focused on a group of Malian university students in Sévaré, the town where he lived, all of whom were inspired by his work. Ouologuem himself did not appear in the documentary, as one town resident cautioned de Hasque against getting too close to the author's house while filming. Senegalese writer Mohamed Mbougar Sarr's novel La plus secrète mémoire des hommes is inspired by Ouologuem's experiences in French publishing. References 1940 births 2017 deaths Malian novelists Malian male writers Male novelists Prix Renaudot winners People from Mopti Region 20th-century novelists 20th-century male writers 21st-century Malian people