Avignon Festival: Nzila and Minoungou Bridge the Living and the Dead

At the Festival d'Avignon, playwrights Israël Nzila and Etienne Minoungou present works that bring together the living and the dead through theater. Minoungou's 'L'intraitable beauté du monde' stages a conversation between authors Edouard Glissant and Sony Labou Tansi, inspired by a letter Glissant and Chamoiseau wrote to Barack Obama in 2008. Minoungou visited Glissant's grave in Martinique to ask permission to use the phrase. He describes the piece as a 'theatre of conversation' where the living celebrate the everyday and the invisible, with the imagination's word as the main actor. Glissant, who died in 2011, was a Martinican writer, philosopher, and poet known for concepts of 'tout-monde' and creolization. Tansi, a Congolese writer born in 1947 and died in 1995, was a prolific playwright and author of 'La vie et demie'. Meanwhile, Nzila's 'Clipping', winner of the 2025 RFI Theatre Prize, follows Do, a woman searching for her child in a Lubumbashi market, haunted by war and violence. The play explores madness and leaves its ending open. Sound is central, with overlapping voices and market noise becoming a character. Directed by Jean Paul Delore, it is performed by a single actress, Lindiwe Martchykiza. Minoungou, founder of the 'Les Récréâtrales' festival in Ouagadougou, performs until July 19. Nzila, born in 1995 in Kinshasa, will have his play available on RFI. Musical programming includes GYSLAN N with 'Tout à l'amour' at Théâtre de l'Arrache-Coeur.