Dakar, May 9 (APS) – The publishing house “Jimsaan” organized, Wednesday, its first literary return in its premises in Dakar, a four-day event (from May 8 to 11) which aims to contribute to the “book ecosystem,” said the writer Felwine Sarr, one of its founders.
”Jimsaan” thus aims to anchor itself in its territory and contribute to the book ecosystem with this literary return where six new works from different horizons (Senegal, Colombia, France/Algeria) published by the publishing house edition will be presented with conversations between authors, round tables around the book and signings, according to Felwine Sarr.
”We want to shed light on books, literature, transmission, culture. We want to participate in this book ecosystem in our own way, because all the books were made in Senegal. We worked with local printers and booksellers. We really want to be part of the ecosystem and contribute to making it high quality by doing rigorous editing work,” he said.
He felt that work on culture is important because ”it is work of meaning, significance and social connection”.
For Felwine Sarr, ”this work has political content, because Senegal has experienced difficult times and it is in-depth work. Culture gave people resources to resist the crisis (…) in the face of authoritarianism, thought took over.
The publishing house ”Jimsaan” was created ten years ago by three Senegalese writers, Boubacar Boris Diop, Nafissatou Dia Diouf and Felwine Sarr.
The objective for these three authors who were publishing abroad at the time was “to produce original, singular, quality texts which were inspired by our imaginations, our experiences, our existence and which fit into our spaces and our stories and the imaginations of the world,” Sarr said.
“A sort of literary requirement,” according to the author of the book “Buddhism was born in Colobane,” a collection of short stories.
Above all, Felwine Sarr underlined, it was a question of making the effort to put their editorial experience into a project to help bring out writers from Senegal and elsewhere who would work on the texts with great care and quality.
”Jimsaan” began, he said, with the reissue of two books: ”The Wound” by Malick Fall, the novel of which had not been found since the death of its author, and ”How to Philosophize in Islam” by Souleymane Bachir Diagne whose publishing house had closed and the text could not be found.
According to publisher Felwine Sarr, very few texts with more essays than novels have been published over the years.
He recalled that ”Jimsaan” returned with the publication in 2018 of the novel ”De purs hommes” by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr and ”The most secret memory of men” in 2021 which won the Goncourt, the greatest award French-speaking literature.
These two works were co-published with ”Philiphe Rey”, a French publishing house with which ”Jimsaan” has established ”a long friendship relationship” since 2013.
”This award shed light on +Jimsaan+ and it gave us resources, the ability to publish much more with new collections poetry novel essay, theater, etc. Which explains why we arrive with this literary season with six books,” said Felwine Sarr.
He noted the expansion of the team with the arrival of the writer Mohamed Mbougar Sarr as director of the ”Roman et Nouvelles” collection, the philosopher Séverine Kodjo-Grandvaux director of the ”Essais” collection, Mossane Sarr administrative manager, Ami Weickaane coordinator and responsible for communications, among others.
The presentation of the collection of poems ”The People of Water” by Issa Daaman Sarr punctuated by a conversation between Felwine Sarr and Mohamed Mbougar Sarr opened this literary season.
”It’s fortunate that we start there, he is a poet of the land, of the people of water, of the relationship with the unity of life which gives voice to communities…”, greeted the editor.
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 – Senegalese press agency){kind=link}