David Diop interview: ‘I now have the good fortune of being considered a real writer’

The LA Review of Books commented on the novel’s ‘incantatory gore’, which describes its unique rhythm and language, as well as the grisly ground it covers. How did you find the right words to describe the physical and mental horrors of both the First World War and Alfa’s unravelling? 

I wanted the character of Alfa to be in an extreme situation from the moment the book begins. That’s why I place him right away in the grips of an impossible choice: either to leave his more-than-brother in agony without helping him die, or to kill him and end his suffering. Throughout the novel, Alfa Niaye replays this primal scene, imbuing it with his regret, discovering his incapacity to get past it. The violence Alfa suffers is not only physical – from the brutalities of the war – but also psychological. My main concern was to maintain the violence of this opening throughout the book by employing a rhythm in the writing, rooted in Mademba’s terror in the face of his own death, to convey the terror that overtakes Alfa.

It’s a slim novel that tackles some huge subjects and themes – war, racism, colonialism, torture, rape, mental illness. Did you ever feel daunted by the project? What kept you motivated while you were writing and editing?

No, I was not daunted by the project because I did not have a project. My only concern was to place my characters in a context that would be faithful to the extreme violence of the First World War, at the moment when France, like other European powers, maintained a colonial empire. My preoccupation was to explore the mind of a colonial soldier thrust into what Blaise Cendrars called a ‘war factory’ (‘guerre usinière’), while thwarting the prejudices associated with the figure of the Senegalese riflemen of this period. 

The fundamental subject was, for me, to show the reader that the Senegalese tirailleurs, often depicted as a homogenous group, were a collective made of individuals. Each tirailleur has a story. Alfa’s is that of a young man with an existing inner fracture, whose arrival on the battlefield only intensifies it.

The final four chapters are especially striking. Did you always know how the book would end?

No. Whereas in my most recent novel, Where the Sky Rests (forthcoming from Pushkin Press) I knew from the start how it would finish, with At Night All Blood Is Black I did not know until the last moment how it was going to end. As a result, the book’s ending is open; the narrative system is, intentionally, ambiguous. We don’t really know who is speaking. Is it Mademba, is it Alfa? This ambiguity took me by surprise when I was writing, and I decided to preserve it at all costs: ‘Now […] he is me and I am him’ are the novel’s final words.

What kinds of responses have you had from readers to At Night All Blood is Black? Have any reactions been especially pleasing or surprising?

I was quite surprised by the reading of a young woman, a high-schooler, who asked me after a presentation of the book ‘Why not imagine that it’s Mademba speaking, not Alfa, from the beginning of your novel?’ This interpretation of the text struck me as perfectly acceptable. I played so much with the duality of the ‘I’ in my tale, that in effect it is possible to think that Alfa may be the fruit of Mademba’s imagination, who may not actually have died on the battlefield, etc…. That young woman’s comment made me recognise, more than any discourse of literary criticism, the limits of intentionality for any writer.

What are you working on at the moment?

I have just published Where the Sky Rests in France, a novel that intertwines two travel narratives that follow the same route, from Egypt to Senegal. One takes place at the end of the 19th century, and the other in the third century BCE. The book engages an oral historical tradition according to which six waves of migration from Ancient Egypt populated West Africa. By telling the story of one of them, I wanted to remind people of what is so often forgotten: that Egypt is located in Africa.

Where and when do you most like to write, and what tools do you need?

I very rarely write out in the world because I require quiet. I write at home in my study, usually in the morning when my thoughts are clear and my academic obligations aren’t yet pulling me elsewhere. 

Over time, I have discovered that to write fiction that will satisfy me, I need to compose by hand and not on a computer keyboard. I use specific notebooks and a particular brand of pen. I wrote all of At Night All Blood Is Black by hand before typing it into the computer. 

I find that when I’m working on fiction, writing in manuscript leads to a more faithful transmission of whatever images and sensations have inspired me to write the scene at hand. I think this is because I learned, along with everyone else in my generation at least, to write my first words on paper, with a pencil or a pen. The embedded memory of this primal gesture encourages a more precise alignment between my thoughts and their expression.

Is there a book from your childhood that made you fall in love with reading?

When I was a child, I loved reading a series of books called Tales and Legends of… from the publishers Fernand Nathan. I would borrow a different volume each week from the library of the French cultural centre in Dakar. The titles ranged from Tales and Legends of Senegal to Tales and Legends of the American Indians… and of Pampa, Spain, Haiti, Britain, etc…. For me it was a way to discover the world through the myths and legends of different peoples. I was enthralled. And perhaps I still am.

Do you have a favourite book in the Booker Library? What do you love about it? 

I adored Paradise, the novel by Abdulrazak Gurnah, which I read in its French translation. To read it was to be transported on a fascinating, violent, journey into the heart of Tanzania – where the book is set – and into the far reaches of the human heart.