Ananda Devi

Ananda Devi was born in Mauritius in 1957, notable for its confluence of diverse ethnic, cultural, and linguistic identities. Devi won her first literary prize at age fifteen for a short story in a Radio France Internationale competition. After a few years spent in Congo-Brazzaville, Devi moved to Ferney-Voltaire in Switzerland in 1989, where she lives today. She has published twelve novels as well as short stories and poetry, and was featured at the PEN World Voices Festival in New York in 2015. Her literary awards include the 2006 Prix des Cinq Continents de la Francophonie and the 2007 Prix Télévision Suisse Romande for Ève de ses décombres, as well as the 2010 Prix Louis-Guilloux and the 2012 Prix Mokanda for other works. In 2010, Devi was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French government, and in 2014 she was awarded the Prix du Rayonnement de la langue et de la littérature françaises by the Académie Française. Her latest novel, Manger l’autre, won the 2018 Prix Étonnants Voyageurs.