An irreverent, allusive, scatalogical, tragicomic masterpiece that
centers on the patrons of a run-down bar as they try to document the
details of their lives in a country that appears to have forgotten the
importance of remembering.
In Republic of the Congo, in the town of Trois-Cents, in a bar called
Credit Gone West, a former schoolteacher known as Broken Glass drinks
red wine and records the stories of the bar and its regulars for
posterity: Stubborn Snail, the owner, who must battle church people,
ex-alcoholics, tribal leaders, and thugs set on destroying him and his
business; the Printer, who had his respectable life in France ruined by
a white woman, his wife; Robinette, who could outdrink and outpiss any
man; and Broken Glass himself, whose own tale involves as much
heartbreak, squalor, disappointment, and delusion.
But Broken Glass fails spectacularly at staying out of trouble as one
denizen after another wants to rewrite history in an attempt at making
sure his portrayal will properly reflect their exciting and dynamic
lives. Despondent over this apparent triumph of self-delusion over
self-awareness, Broken Glass drowns his sorrows and riffs on the great
books of Africa and the West. Brimming with life, death, and literary
allusions, Broken Glass is Mabanckou's finest novel--a mocking satire
of the dangers of artistic integrity.
