رزی کارپ

by Marie NDiaye, مرضیه کردبچه (Translator)

برادرها بر می‌گردند و ذله‌مان می‌كنند. آن وقت فقط يك آرزو داريم. اين كه دوباره در دوردست ناپديد شوند و برای هميشه از ياد بروند؛

Genres: Fiction, France, Novels, Roman

320 pages, Paperback

First published February 22, 2001

About the author

Marie NDiaye was born in Pithiviers, France, in 1967; spent her childhood with her French mother (her father was Senegalese); and studied linguistics at the Sorbonne. She started writing when she was twelve or thirteen years old and was only eighteen when her first work was published. In 2001 she was awarded the prestigious Prix Femina literary prize for her novel Rosie Carpe, and in 2009, she won the Prix Goncourt for Three Strong Women.

Reviews

[MJ Nicholls]

An endearing and breathless style, bringing to mind Boris Vian’s little pearl Heartsnatcher, kept me skating along the thin-ice plot, opaque happenings and wraithlike protagonist for the first two parts. Rosie Carpe is a deliriously enigmatic character, a female receptacle, airily disengaged from her surroundings, who finds herself knocked up by a hotel manager and amateur pornographer, constantly pining for her brother Lazare. NDiaye’s narrator is cheek-to-cheek with her characters, yet she offers erudite assessments of their behaviour (don’t tell the creative writing tutors)—flighty and profound in Rosie’s case, not so strong in Lagrand’s narrative. In fact, this position switch disengaged me completely from the text—our microbiological attachment to Rosie, distant even when close, is taxing enough, so when the position swifts to a lesser character, it’s near impossible to pass through the opaque fog. So I gave up. Sorry Marie. I’ll try harder next time. NDiaye is one of France’s top female black writers: this is her only book in English translation.

[Negin Moradi · Rating 1 out of 5]

دلیلی که تصمیم گرفتم "رزی کارپ" رو بخونم این بود که هیچ نظر فارسی درموردش توی گودریدز پیدا نکردم و دوست داشتم از اولین افرادی باشم که داستان رو می‌خونه‌. حالا با اطمینان می‌تونم بگم که خوندنش هیچ چیزی به من اضافه نکرد.
۳۰۰ صفحه از شخصیت‌های نفرت‌انگیز که فکر می‌کنن بچه‌دار شدن فقط به رابطه‌ی جنسی ختم میشه و هیچ مسئولیتی در آینده‌ی فرزندانشون ندارن واقعا برام آزاردهنده بود و حتی اگه ادامه‌ی داستان رو نمی‌خوندم، سرنوشت رزی کارپ برام کوچک‌ترین اهمیتی نداشت.

[Natasa Tovornik · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very depressing although excellent written. Even the positive characters just do not have the will and power to fight the evil. A good portrait of a "no way out" situation and with a lot of in-depth monologues by the main character. Superbly described fears and thought of the characters. Great literature although very hard (and slow) to read.

[lulu.castagnette · Rating 5 out of 5]

franchement i loved it même si c’est 400 pages d’une écriture (vraiment excellente) parfois assez dure à lire mais jamais gratuite ou inintéressante

[Leah Rachel von Essen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rosie Carpe by Marie NDiaye, translated by Tamsin Black, is a bleak, fascinating novel. Rosie appears in Guadaloupe pregnant, with her young son in tow, led on by her brother Lazare's stories of finding wild success on the island. But she is picked up by a stranger, Lagrand, and soon finds that Lazare's letters were misleading.

Rosie and Lazare were teens when their parents abandoned them in Paris to fend for themselves, and Rosie's life began to crumble from there. She is bold in her newfound sexuality, but then is trapped in manipulative relationships and abusive scenarios. She neglects her son. She asks everyone she meets if they've met her brother, hoping to track him down. She is painfully innocent, and becomes increasingly unhinged. At her core are the determination to survive and the much stronger yearning for contentment, a yearning that's already been dashed but that she can't let go of. Cast into a world that she wasn't ready for, Rosie always feels unprepared, lost, confused.

It makes for an often depressing novel with stunning writing that conveys Rosie's innocence, confusion, and deep-seated pain. As she discovers, again and again, that there is no way out, that there is no path for her, she grows increasingly delirious, and the writing reflects this spiral, this anxiety—sometimes, too, the unwillingness to see ugliness in front of her in people she cares about, or in her own actions.

Content warnings for sexual abuse and exploitation, alcoholism, rape, miscarriage, child neglect and abuse.

[mims · Rating 4 out of 5]

“we’ve used and abused you, haven’t we, lagrand?” horrible horrible shit happens in this novel and the good people can’t do anything about it: evil swingers, poor dogs, poisoned guavas, and awful hotel rooms. marie ndiaye’s always had the juice!

the cycle of abuse within the family and our inevitable transformation into monsters or husks. people robbed of agency and dignity and the people that do the robbing. the degraded lawlessness and amorality of a colonial vacation outpost. i’m afraid of the color yellow

read this during a bad month in my life and made me feel better because….. rosie carpe had it way worse

[KLK]

Marie NDiaye was born in Pithiviers, France, in 1967; spent her childhood with her French mother (her father was Senegalese); and studied linguistics at the Sorbonne. She started writing when she was twelve or thirteen years old and was only eighteen when her first work was published. In 2001 she was awarded the prestigious Prix Femina literary prize for her novel Rosie Carpe, and in 2009, she won the Prix Goncourt for Three Strong Women.

[3r1nette · Rating 2 out of 5]

hated this. boring. didn’t understand the characters at all. they are completely crazy. go see a therapist please. thanks.

[Ami Furness · Rating 2 out of 5]

idk man I love love loveeee NDiaye but this was slow n kinda boring oopsie…

[Persephone Abbott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having read "Three Strong Women" first, I recognized many themes present in the author's writing in this earlier novel: ruined family relations, distortion of time and movement to describe irresponsibility, a use of rotting or fetid odours, feeble male behaviour, etc. The Goncourt winning and later novel "Women" was, in my eyes, better. I felt that this one, "Rosie Carpe," was a run up to a cleaner work to come. Still, Ndiaye tightly controls the characters, the anxiety, the delirium so well, I couldn't put it down from the second half onwards. I hesitated between three and four stars, simply because by the end I felt I was watching a sort of David Lynchian television drama, and it felt tawdry. Well the story was tawdry and that was the point, and Ndiaye succeeded in proving her point.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the earliest of NDiaye's novels I've read, and I read it after three of her more recent books. While I found it still dazzling in her breathless style, it's also much slower going, both because of the interiority of the two different points of views she employs and because more is in the perception of what takes place, of the other characters, than the actions themselves (surprising, horrific as those may be). I liked the novel and found it compelling (I will probably read anything NDiaye writes), but the final denouement, where we see the characters some years later down the road, takes an incredibly bizarre turn. I am still trying to figure that bit out.

[Dokusha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Preisgekrönt oder nicht, Marie NDiaye ist mir hier zu depressiv und "flach". Der Schreibstil ist teilweise sehr schön, aber das reicht nicht, um den traurigen Inhalt zu überdecken. Maan hat den Eindruck ,die ganze Geschichte sspielt sich in einem Topf voller Sirup ab, so zäh kommen die Beschreibungen teilweise daher. Dazu kommt, daß ich mit einem Charakter wie Rosie nicht wirklich was anfagen kann - gibt es solche seltsamen Typen wirklich? Es war ok, das mal gelesen zu haben, aber noch mal ist meiner Ansicht nach bestimmt nicht nötig.

[Lu · Rating 2 out of 5]

Livre à lire si tout va parfaitement bien dans votre vie. L'écriture et l'histoire m'ont plongée dans un malaise absolu et sans fin. Aux deux tiers du livre j'ai craqué et sauté les pages en lisant en diagonale juste pour savoir ce que deviennent les personnages. Je n'en pouvais plus. Je comprends que l'écriture soit révolutionnaire (on est vraiment dans la tête de chaque personnage) mais tout m'a beaucoup pesée. Il faudrait que je lise autre chose de la même autrice. Ici j'ai été trop bouleversée par la misère crasse.

[Wies Bijnens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Een ontstellend verhaal over onze tijd.
Een liefdeloos opgevoede vrouw belandt van de ene nachtmerrie in de andere.Ze krijgt een kind dat ze eigenlijk verwaarloost.
Ndiaye kruipt in het hoofd van haar personage.Beklijvend!

[Marceline · Rating 4 out of 5]

Magistral et énigmatique. On ne saurait dire ce qui vous captive dans ce roman, au delà de la maîtrise de la langue et de ce style puissant et original. On ne saurait non plus dire quel est le propos du livre. Mais cette littérature là a de l'estomac!

[Mina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating. Highly disturbing dystopic view of the world.

[Emilie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Abrupt, dur, rude, rugueux. Quelle belle écriture ! Mais quel coup de bourdon...

[Sasha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Je préfère 3FP mais tout de même somptueux. Ca vaut la peine de se fatiguer!