This play by renowned poet and political activist Aime Césaire recounts the tragic death of Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Congo Republic and an African nationalist hero. A Season in the Congo follows Lumumba’s efforts to free the Congolese from Belgian rule and the political struggles that led to his assassination in 1961. Césaire powerfully depicts Lumumba as a sympathetic, Christ-like figure whose conscious martyrdom reflects his self-sacrificing humanity and commitment to pan-Africanism. Born in Martinique and educated in Paris, Césaire was a revolutionary artist and lifelong political activist, who founded the Martinique Independent Revolution Party. Césaire’s ardent personal opposition to Western imperialism and racism fuels both his profound sympathy for Lumumba and the emotional strength of A Season in the Congo. Now rendered in a lyrical translation by distinguished scholar Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Césaire’s play will find a new audience of readers interested in world literature and the vestiges of European colonialism.
Author
Martinique-born poet, playwright, and politician Aimé Fernand Césaire contributed to the development of the concept of negritude; his primarily surrealist works include The Miracle Weapons (1946) and A Tempest (1969). A francophone author of African descent. His books of include Lost Body, with illustrations by Pablo Picasso, Aimé Césaire: The Collected Poetry, and Return to My Native Land. He is also the author of Discourse on Colonialism, a book of essays which has become a classic text of French political literature and helped establish the literary and ideological movement Negritude, a term Césaire defined as “the simple recognition of the fact that one is black, the acceptance of this fact and of our destiny as blacks, of our history and culture.” Césaire is a recipient of the International Nâzim Hikmet Poetry Award, the second winner in its history. He served as Mayor of Fort-de-France as a member of the Communist Party, and later quit the party to establish his Martinique Independent Revolution Party. He was deeply involved in the struggle for French West Indian rights and served as the deputy to the French National Assembly. He retired from politics in 1993. Césaire died in Martinique.
