Desert

Desert by Jmg Le Clezio

Young Nour is a North African desert tribesman. It is 1909, and as the First World War looms Nour's tribe - the Blue Men - are forced from their lands by French colonial invaders. Spurred on by thirst, hunger, suffering, they seek guidance from a great spiritual leader. The holy man sends them even further from home, on an epic journey northward, in the hope of finding a land in which they can again be free. Decades later, an orphaned descendant of the Blue Men - a girl called Lalla - is living in a shantytown on the coast of Morocco. Lalla has inherited both the pride and the resilience of her tribe - and she will need them, as she makes a bid to escape her forced marriage to a wealthy older man. She flees to Marseilles, where she experiences both the hardships of immigrant life - as a hotel maid - and the material prosperity of those who succeed - when she becomes a successful model. And yet Lalla does not betray the legacy of her ancestors. In these two narratives set in counterpoint, Nobel Prize-winning novelist J. M. G. Le Clézio tells - powerfully and movingly - the story of the 'last free men' and of Europe's colonial legacy - a story of war and exile and of the endurance of the human spirit.

* 'In scenes of shimmering intensity, Le Clezio contrasts nature's stark and majestic clarity, from scouring sand to the incinerating sun and the vast gleaming net of stars, with the chaos, toxicity, and injustice of human lifeA long time coming for English-language readers, Le Clezio's incandescent masterpiece couldn't be more relevant.' Booklist (starred review) 'As a reader who usually skips from one book to another, it is a singular experience to have found myself, having scarcely finished J. M. G. Le Clezio's Desert, certain that before long I would have an almost physical need to reread it. As I did, a fortnight later... Desert is a book of a beauty as unlimited as the desert itself.' Bernard Pivot, Lire 'A writer of something akin to genius' Sunday Telegraph

J. M. G. Le Clezio was born on 13 April 1940 in Nice and was educated at the University College of Nice and at Bristol and London universities. Since publication of his first novel, Le Proces verbal (The Interrogation), he has written over forty highly acclaimed books, while his work has been translated into thirty-six languages. He divides his time between France (Nice, Paris and Brittany), New Mexico and Mauritius. In 2008 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781848873797
ISBN 10	1848873794
Title	Desert
Author	Jmg Le Clezio
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Atlantic Books
Year published	2010-02-01
Number of pages	368
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable