Friday 12th October, 5.30pm

 

Puukare by Thierno Seydou Sall book launch

 

On the occasion of the exhibition Toutes les fautes qu’il y avait dans le monde, je les ai ramassées (All of the wrongs that were in the world, I gathered them up) at RAW Material Company and the launch of the book Puukare by Thierno Seydou Sall (Éditions EJO), we invite you to a special Friday @ RAW dedicated to the work of this poet-artist.

 

A panel discussion with editor Ndèye Codou Fall (Éditions EJO) and writer Pape Samba Kane will be followed by a recital with Thierno Seydou Sall and the Youssoupha Féhé Sarr aka Rhapsod.

 

Puukare

Puukare by Thierno Seydou Sall is a mirror held up to his own people, to Senegalese society. Each one of us will see themselves in the book, whether we want to or not, faced with ourselves in an at times painful exercise of introspection. These beautiful poems essentially invite us to a respect for humans and tell us to never do unto another as we would not want done to ourselves. The reading of Puukare is an experience particularly exalting. We come out of it with a conscience even more alive with values of solidarity and a taste for hard work, the foundations of a harmonious co-existence.

 

Éditions EJO

EJO is a Kinyarwanda word meaning both yesterday and tomorrow. We found it all the more fascinating that publishing in African languages, promoting them, is in direct line with the teachings of our mentor Cheikh Anta Diop. At the core of Diop’s thoughts and writings was the firm belief that Black Africans need to better know their past and be proud of it in order to be able to face the challenges of the future.

The choice of a Rwandan name for a Senegalese publishing house is a way to underscore the Pan-Africanist ideals of whose importance Cheikh Anta Diop made us so aware of.

 

Thierno Seydou Sall  

Thierno Seydou Sall has been under the spell of poetry since he was very young, when his head seemed to be “full of crazy ideas” that made him stand apart from other people. His poetic moorings are primarily in rural villages, where he has worked for many years with international and local agencies. A “wandering poet,” he has nonetheless published several collections of poetry in Wolof and French, among them Kër Dof (The Mad House), Bouffées délirantes (Delusional Outbursts), and L’Envol des pélicans (Pelicans in Flight), prefaced by Senegalese novelist, Cheikh Hamidou Kane. His poems affirm and challenge local, traditional culture and values and call on his audiences, regardless of age, gender or status, to stand up for the environment, equality and social justice, especially with respect to women and children. Thierno Seydou Sall has also worked with musicians. He is now taking advantage of new media, television, radio and digital platforms to disseminate his work.

 

Pape Samba Kane

Pape Samba Kane is the founder of a number of newspapers, in particular the satirical paper Le Cafard Libéré (The Freed Cockroach). After more than 30 years of journalism, in 2015 he published a novel Sabaru Jinne or The Devil’s Drums, with Éditions Feu de brousse (Dakar), and then a collection of poems À Tire d’Elles with Lettres de Renaissances (Paris).

 

Rhapsod

Youssoupha Féhé Sarr aka Rhapsod is a student researcher and hip hop artist who grew up in Dakar. He was drawn to hip hop very early on, initially through breakdancing and then through rap music in his teenage years. But he also grew up in an environment where other music genres were more prevalent. He is the youngest of several creative siblings who express themselves in more eclectic styles that are often crossroads where traditional music from the Malian empire will come into collision with Afrobeat, jazz and other black musical styles, along with literary forms from the four corners of the world.