SOURCE: HAITIANTIMES

Haitian novelist Emmelie Prophète has won the 2022 Carbet de Lycéens, an international prize awarded in Guadeloupe, for her novel “The Villages of God.”

“I’m really happy and satisfied,” Prophète, who is also the minister of Culture and of Communication, told Le Nouvelliste. “I share this joy with all Haitians who live in Caribbean islands, and are very happy and proud of this great news that came in the midst of a lot of bad news that we hear in our country.”

“The Villages of God” tells the story of a young girl named Célia who lives in the thick of armed gangs, kidnapping and prostitution in Port-au-Prince. 

The international award from Guadeloupe is the third by a French-speaking country that Prophète has received since the 2020 novel was published. Prophète won the Ivory Prize for African Literature of Francophone Expression and the Fetkann Maryse Condé prize in 2021.

Guadeloupe’s Carbet of High Schoolers was created in 1999 to promote Caribbean literature in high schools and encourage students to learn Caribbean history. Three other Haitian writers have won the Carbet of High Schoolers award over the years: Dany Laferrière in 2001, Edwidge Danticat in 2010, Gisèle Pineau in 2011 and Néhémy Pierre-Dahomey in 2018.