Marie NDiaye

Marie NDiaye (born 4 June 1967) is a French novelist, playwright and screenwriter. She published her first novel, Quant au riche avenir, when she was 17. She won the Prix Goncourt in 2009 for her novel Trois femmes puissantes (Three Strong Women). Her play Papa doit manger is the sole play by a living female writer to be part of the repertoire of the Comédie française. She co-wrote the screenplay for the 2022 legal drama Saint Omer alongside its director Alice Diop, and Amrita David. In September 2022, the film was selected as France's official selection for Best International Film at the 95th Academy Awards. The English translation of her novel The Witch, by Jordan Stump, was published in 2026 and was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize.

Biography NDiaye was born in 1967 in Pithiviers, France, to a French mother and a Senegalese father. She grew up with her mother and her brother Pap Ndiaye in the suburbs of Paris. Her parents met as students in the mid-1960s, but her father returned to Senegal when she was one year old.

She began writing at the age of 12. As a senior in high school, she was discovered by Jerome Lindon, founder of Éditions de Minuit, who published her first novel, Quant au riche avenir, in 1985.

She subsequently wrote six more novels, all published by Minuit, and a collection of short stories. She also wrote her Comédie classique, a 200-page novel made up of a single sentence, which was published by Éditions P.O.L in 1988, when she was 21 years old. In addition, NDiaye has written several plays. She co-wrote the screenplay for White Material with director Claire Denis. NDiaye's 2003 drama Papa doit manger is distinguished as the second play by a female writer to be taken into the repertoire of the Comédie française.

In 1998, NDiaye wrote a letter to the press in which she argued that her novel La Sorcière, published two years earlier, had strongly informed the content of Naissance des fantômes, the second novel of successful author Marie Darrieussecq.

NDiaye's novel Trois femmes puissantes won the 2009 Prix Goncourt. In his 2013 critical study of the author, Marie NDiaye: Blankness and Recognition, British academic Andrew Asibong describes her as "the epitome of a certain kind of cultural brilliance". In his psychoanalytic exploration of the writer's evocation of trauma and disavowal, he says that "NDiaye's work explores the violence done to the subject's capacity for feeling and knowing".

In 2026, her novel The Witch, translated into English by Jordan Stump, was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize.

Awards and honours

2001: Prix Femina for Rosie Carpe 2009: Prix Goncourt for Trois femmes puissantes (Three Strong Women) 2012: Grand prix du théâtre de l'Académie française 2015: Nelly Sachs Prize 2016: Ladivine longlisted for Man Booker International Prize 2017: Ladivine shortlisted for Best Translated Book Award 2018: Ladivine shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award 2023: Austrian State Prize for European Literature 2026: The Witch shortlisted for the International Booker Prize

Works

Novels and short stories Quant au riche avenir – Les Editions de Minuit, 1985 Comédie classique – , 1988 La femme changée en bûche – Minuit, 1989 En famille – Minuit, 1991 Translated into English as Among Family by Heather Doyal – Angela Royal Publishing, 1997 Un temps de saison – Minuit, 1994 Translated into English as That Time of Year by Jordan Stump – Two Lines Press, 2020 La Sorcière – Minuit, 1996 Translated into English as The Witch by Jordan Stump – Vintage, 2026 Rosie Carpe – Minuit, Prix Femina 2001 Translated into English as Rosie Carpe by Tamsin Black – Bison Books, 2004 Tous mes amis, nouvelles – Minuit, 2004 Translated into English as All My Friends by Jordan Stump – Two Lines Press, 2013 Autoportrait en vert – Mercure de France, 2005 Translated into English as Self-Portrait in Green by Jordan Stump – Two Lines Press, 2014 Mon cœur a l'etroit – Éditions Gallimard, 2007 Translated into English as My Heart Hemmed In by Jordan Stump – Two Lines Press, 2017 Trois femmes puissantes – Gallimard, Prix Goncourt, 2009 . Translated into English as Three Strong Women by John Fletcher – MacLehose Press & Alfred A. Knopf, 2013 ; extracted in New Daughters of Africa, edited by Margaret Busby (2019). Ladivine – Gallimard, 2013 Translated into English as Ladivine by Jordan Stump – Alfred A. Knopf, 2016 & MacLehose Press, 2016 La Cheffe, roman d'une cuisinière – Gallimard, 2016 Translated into English as The Cheffe by Jordan Stump – Alfred A. Knopf, 2019 & MacLehose Press, 2019 La vengeance m’appartient – Gallimard, 2022 (ISBN 9782072977220) Translated into English as Vengeance is Mine by Jordan Stump – Alfred A. Knopf, 2023 (ISBN 9780593534243) Le bon Denis – Mercure de France, 2025

Plays Hilda – Minuit, 1999 Papa doit manger – Minuit, 2003 Rien d'humain – Les Solitaires Intempestifs, 2004 Les serpents – Minuit, 2004

Children's novels La diablesse et son enfant, illustration Nadja – , 2000 Les paradis de Prunelle, illustration Pierre Mornet – Albin Michel Jeunesse, 2003 Le souhait, illustration Alice Charbin – École des Loisirs, 2005

Essays La naufragée – Flohic, 1999

Screenplay White Material (2009), co-written with director Claire Denis