Sandrine Collette wins with “Madelaine avant l’aube” the Goncourt for prisoners, after that for high school students

His novel is a flamboyant rural tale celebrating the spirit of revolt.

The novelist Sandrine Collette won the Goncourt prize for prisoners on Tuesday, December 17 with Madelaine before dawnalready crowned with the Goncourt for high school students at the end of November, announced the National Book Center.

This novel, which resembles a tale set in the Middle Ages, recounting the arrival in a village of a wild child, was published in August by JC Lattès. It reached the final of the Prix Goncourt at the beginning of November, where it received one vote. , among the ten jurors.

Created in 2022, the Goncourt for prisoners is the result of the deliberations of 600 jurors in 45 penitentiary establishments throughout France, including overseas. The process ended with a final deliberation of ten detainees, men and women, meeting behind closed doors at the National Book Center in Paris. The president of the CNL, Régine Hatchondo, welcomed in a press release “the culmination of these four months of meetings, readings and debates”.

Sandrine Collette, 54, first distinguished herself in dark novels, the success of which allowed her to nourish her passion for horses. Then she moved on to what the publishing world calls “white literature”, that which competes for the major literary prizes. A doctor in political science who branched out into administrative professions at university, she now devotes herself to writing from her region of origin, Morvan.