Camara Laye was a novelist from Guinea, born in 1928. He is regarded as a foundational writer of Francophone African literature.
Born in the town of Kouroussa, French Guinea (at the time a French colony), Laye studied mechanics as a teenager in the country's capital of Conakry. In 1947, he moved to Paris and furthered his education in engineering. These formative events became the source material for his 1953 autobiographical novel, L'Enfant noir (The Dark Child). The book won the 1954 Prix Charles Veillon.
Laye followed his debut with Le Regard du roi (The Radiance of the King), published in 1954. Laye moved back to Africa in 1956, where he worked for the now-independent government of...
