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The French novelist Karine Tuile won Thursday, November 14 the Goncourt prize of high school students 2019 with "Human Things", the trial of a rape. A prize awarded by twelve high school students and very coveted because as prescriber for the sale as the most prestigious French literary prize, the "true" Goncourt.
After winning the Interallie Prize on Wednesday, Karine Tuil had the favor of the Goncourt high school jury on Thursday. " I am extremely moved, " said the novelist after the announcement. It is a great joy to participate in these exchanges with high school students. "
The story of the novel revolves around a case of rape and thus echoes the media news of recent days in France with the statements of the actress Adele Haenel and the new accusations against the filmmaker Roman Polanski .
Karine Tuil presents a very effective story that juggles power, sex and the media. It tells the story from the point of view of a juror of Assize Court. Without a filter, the case against Alexander, the son of a TV star journalist and a feminist mother, is at the forefront. He is accused of raping Mila, the daughter of his mother's new mate, on the campus of Stanford University. Nevertheless, he can count on his support.
The construction of realities
The novelist says she started working on the subject of the "culture" of rape long before the Weinstein case and the #MeToo movement. With a very controlled language, it brings out the games and stakes of power with all the collateral damage that this implies for society. " Depending on your social position, you will not be judged in the same way. As in several previous books, the construction of stories and realities is at the heart of Karine Tuil's literary preoccupations.
Created by the Fnac and the French Ministry of Education and Youth, the prize is awarded by a jury of twelve high school students, from a panel of 2,000 students from fifty schools throughout the country , including a high school in Fort-de-France (Martinique).
Capture the atmosphere of an era
With Karine Tuil, the high school students' Goncourt honors a very prolific author. Born in 1972 in Paris, she is the author of eleven novels. She began her writing career after law school with For the Worst in 2000, where she observed the slow and painful breakdown of a couple. The first success came with Interdit in 2001, which evokes the identity crisis of an old Jew. Her trilogy on the Jewish family also goes through Female Sex in 2002 where she delicately relates and crosses Jewish humor through mother-daughter relationships.
In 2012, with L'Invention de nos vies , she presents a novel that transcends the life of French society, alluding to the riots in the suburbs of 2005, the calvary of the young Jew Ilan Halimi, kidnapped and martyred by the "gang of barbarians", going through the phenomenon of French jihadists, to the sex business of Dominique-Strauss Kahn.
In Human Things , she also aims to capture, beyond a history, the atmosphere of an era by incorporating many events that have marked the French society, including the antisemitic killing of Toulouse perpetrated by Mohamed Merah .