Black Boy

Drawing the blues
Published in 1945, Black Boy is not only Richard Wright's first book, but also the first novel written by a black man about his living conditions. In it, the author recounts his childhood and adolescence in Mississippi at the beginning of the 20th century. Confronted with injustice, misery and the violence of relations between blacks and whites, he managed to break out of the straitjacket in which he was confined thanks to his discovery of reading and writing. Black Boy is therefore simultaneously an autobiographical story, a novel of initiation and emancipation.

The show offers a "sensitive vibration" of this work, as mythical as it is deeply moving. In three voices, to create a symbiosis between writing, music and drawing, it brings together on stage actor and director Jérôme Imard, Olivier Gotti, one of the jewels in the crown of the new French blues generation, and Jules Stromboni, illustrator and performer, known for his graphic novel Mazzeru and the comic strip Shakespeare World (Casterman).

-> As a prelude to the show, Jules Stromboni will be exhibiting his work at l'abc, from 7 Sept. to 26 Oct. 2023.