At Night All Blood is Black

"At Night All Blood is Black" er David Diops prisbelønnede roman om krig, og hvad det gør ved de mennesker, der sendes ud for at dræbe og blive dræbt. I "At Night All Blood is Black" møder vi Alfa og Mademba, der er to af mange senegalesiske soldater, der tager del i Anden Verdenskrig. De kravler lydigt ud af skyttegravene for at beskyde Frankrigs tyske fjender, når fløjten lyder. Lige indtil Mademba bliver såret og dør på slagmarken med en sønderrevet mave. Uden sin bedste ven ved sin side er Alfa helt alene og fortabt i krigens uforudsigelighed og brutalitet. Han dedikerer sig fuldstændig til krig, død og vold, men snart er selv hans soldaterkammerater bange for ham og det, han er i stand til. Hvor langt vil Alfa gå for at forsøge at give sin døde ven oprejsning? David Diop vandt den internationale bookerpris i 2021 for ”At Night All Blood is Black”.

"At Night All Blood is Black" er David Diops prisbelønnede roman om krig, og hvad det gør ved de mennesker, der sendes ud for at dræbe og blive dræbt. I "At Night All Blood is Black" møder vi Alfa og Mademba, der er to af mange senegalesiske soldater, der tager del i Anden Verdenskrig. De kravler lydigt ud af skyttegravene for at beskyde Frankrigs tyske fjender, når fløjten lyder. Lige indtil Mademba bliver såret og dør på slagmarken med en sønderrevet mave. Uden sin bedste ven ved sin side er Alfa helt alene og fortabt i krigens uforudsigelighed og brutalitet. Han dedikerer sig fuldstændig til krig, død og vold, men snart er selv hans soldaterkammerater bange for ham og det, han er i stand til. Hvor langt vil Alfa gå for at forsøge at give sin døde ven oprejsning? David Diop vandt den internationale bookerpris i 2021 for ”At Night All Blood is Black”.

Astonishingly good. --Lily Meyer, NPR So incantatory and visceral I don't think I'll ever forget it. -- Ali Smith, The Guardian Best Books of 2020 Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize One of The Wall Street Journal 's 11 best books of the fall One of The A.V. Club 's fifteen best books of 2020 A Sunday Times best book of the year Selected by students across France to win the Prix Goncourt des Lyc ens, David Diop's English-language, historical fiction debut At Night All Blood is Black is a "powerful, hypnotic, and dark novel" ( Livres Hebdo ) of terror and transformation in the trenches of the First World War. Alfa Ndiaye is a Senegalese man who, never before having left his village, finds himself fighting as a so-called "Chocolat" soldier with the French army during World War I. When his friend Mademba Diop, in the same regiment, is seriously injured in battle, Diop begs Alfa to kill him and spare him the pain of a long and agonizing death in No Man's Land. Unable to commit this mercy killing, madness creeps into Alfa's mind as he comes to see this refusal as a cruel moment of cowardice. Anxious to avenge the death of his friend and find forgiveness for himself, he begins a macabre ritual: every night he sneaks across enemy lines to find and murder a blue-eyed German soldier, and every night he returns to base, unharmed, with the German's severed hand. At first his comrades look at Alfa's deeds with admiration, but soon rumors begin to circulate that this super soldier isn't a hero, but a sorcerer, a soul-eater. Plans are hatched to get Alfa away from the front, and to separate him from his growing collection of hands, but how does one reason with a demon, and how far will Alfa go to make amends to his dead friend? Peppered with bullets and black magic, this remarkable novel fills in a forgotten chapter in the history of World War I. Blending oral storytelling traditions with the gritty, day-to-day, journalistic horror of life in the trenches, David Diop's At Night All Blood is Black is a dazzling tale of a man's descent into madness.

Astonishingly good. --Lily Meyer, NPR So incantatory and visceral I don't think I'll ever forget it. -- Ali Smith, The Guardian Best Books of 2020 Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize One of The Wall Street Journal 's 11 best books of the fall One of The A.V. Club 's fifteen best books of 2020 A Sunday Times best book of the year Selected by students across France to win the Prix Goncourt des Lyc ens, David Diop's English-language, historical fiction debut At Night All Blood is Black is a "powerful, hypnotic, and dark novel" ( Livres Hebdo ) of terror and transformation in the trenches of the First World War. Alfa Ndiaye is a Senegalese man who, never before having left his village, finds himself fighting as a so-called "Chocolat" soldier with the French army during World War I. When his friend Mademba Diop, in the same regiment, is seriously injured in battle, Diop begs Alfa to kill him and spare him the pain of a long and agonizing death in No Man's Land. Unable to commit this mercy killing, madness creeps into Alfa's mind as he comes to see this refusal as a cruel moment of cowardice. Anxious to avenge the death of his friend and find forgiveness for himself, he begins a macabre ritual: every night he sneaks across enemy lines to find and murder a blue-eyed German soldier, and every night he returns to base, unharmed, with the German's severed hand. At first his comrades look at Alfa's deeds with admiration, but soon rumors begin to circulate that this super soldier isn't a hero, but a sorcerer, a soul-eater. Plans are hatched to get Alfa away from the front, and to separate him from his growing collection of hands, but how does one reason with a demon, and how far will Alfa go to make amends to his dead friend? Peppered with bullets and black magic, this remarkable novel fills in a forgotten chapter in the history of World War I. Blending oral storytelling traditions with the gritty, day-to-day, journalistic horror of life in the trenches, David Diop's At Night All Blood is Black is a dazzling tale of a man's descent into madness.