Karine Tuil wins the Highschooler's Goncourt Prize


The book who won the Highschooler’s Goncourt this year is Les Choses Humaines written by Karine Tuil. Here is the author's biography, to help you better understand her life and career :


Biography :

Karine Tuil was born in Paris on 3rd May 1972, she’s a french novelist.

After receiving her baccalaureate, she studied law and obtained a DEA (a law and communication diploma) at Paris II University. She became a lawyer and wrote a thesis that she abandoned later ; focusing on writing, as she explained in her interview for the literary website « Onlalu » :

« I understood that it was the dream of a whole life. So I put my thesis aside and never went back to it. »

Her novels deal with people’s contradictions, melancholy, existential crisis, humour, Judaism and the hypocrisy of modern life. They offer a no-filter analysis of today’s society.

Since 2010, her books have always been rewarded :


2010 : Six mois, six jours received the Roman News Prize

2013 : L’invention de nos vies received the “Les Lauriers Verts” Literary Prize

2016 : L’insouciance received the Reader’s Landerneau Prize

2019 : Les Choses Humaines won the Interallié and Highschooler’s Goncourt Prizes


 

Summary of Les Choses Humaines :

Les Choses Humaines was published the 22nd August 2019 at the Gallimard editions. This book has been nominated for numerous autumn literary prizes’ selections, including the Highschooler’s Goncourt and the Femina Prizes. This same year 2019, Les Choses Humaines is a laureate of both the Interallié and Highschooler’s Goncourt Prizes.


It is really a book with both suspense and rebounds, who deals with subjects such as social ascension, domination and several problems from today’s society who are linked with power, sex, consent and feminism.


Jean Farel is a famous journalist. His wife, Claire Farel, is a fervent feminist. She denounces the violence that women undergo daily (a topic that we often talk about with the #metoo) in all the interviews she has been on. Their son, Alexandre Farel is a brilliant student attending Standford University. At first, their home life seems perfect, but everything’s going to change when Alexandre Farel is accused of rape. We will progressively learn that Claire Farel has a lover for whom she is going to leave her husband and that Jean Farel also has a mistress. The novel tells the long process of the disciplinary proceeding before the trial and the trial itself. During the trial, we discover the hidden faces of the characters, including Jean Farel which appears to be an abusive father. Karine Tuil is both able to make us admire and love the characters and to make us hate them.


In class, we voted for three books, such as Les Choses Humaines, before the national deliberation and the official result.

 

Sophie and Thanh-Hà (translation : Yasmine and Tyana)