“Go build a life somewhere else and never come back.” – This is what Kossi Efoui’s mother says to him in Une magie ordinaire, urging him to flee Togo. Both mother and son experience deep, irreparable losses – shaped by exile, the erasure of language through colonisation, and political repression. And both choose to transform these “hard things” into artistic expression – the mother through singing, the son through writing.
In the programme Literatur im Gespräch broadcast on Saarländischer Rundfunk, Kossi Efoui, currently an artist-in-residence at the Käte Hamburger Centre CURE, speaks with journalist Tilla Fuchs about his latest novel and his time in Saarbrücken. He also shares his thoughts on cultural practises of healing and the inextricable link between poetry and magic. For Efoui – who has been living in exile in France since fleeing Togo – the “ordinary magic” that gives his book its title is a way of seeing the world, in which “hard things” are both the foundation and the fuel of literary creation.
“When life is hard, when you cannot say everything aloud, poetry does not heal – but it can give you the strength to keep going.” – Kossi Efoui in conversation with Tilla Fuchs, SR Kultur.
You can listen to the full interview here: ARD Audiothek.
➔ Literatur im Gespräch with Kossi Efoui (SR Kultur, 18 February 2025)
