The Goncourt of high school students 2023 awarded to Neige Sinno for “Sad Tiger” – Libération

2023-11-23 14:13:33

Libédossier’s Livres notebook Very popular in bookstores, the prize awarded by a jury of thousands of high school students crowned this novel which has already been recomposed with the Femina prize.

It is one of the awards with the strongest impact in bookstores, almost as prescriptive as its big brother, the “real” Goncourt. The 2023 Goncourt prize for high school students was awarded this Thursday, November 23 to Neige Sinno for her novel Sad Tiger. The work, already awarded by Femina, stands out from a list of seven titles which included Veiller sur elle by Jean-Baptiste Andrea, winner of the Goncourt 2023. It is the story of the rapes suffered by the author during seven years from a stepfather. “Because to me too, deep down, what seems most interesting to me is what is happening in the head of the executioner. Victims are easy, we can all put ourselves in their place,” writes the author in the incipit of her work.

The seven finalists were chosen “after more than two months of diligent reading of the 16 novels in the running, from the first selection of the Académie Goncourt”, according to the press release which specifies that the high school students delegates from each region deliberated at behind closed doors. The regional deliberations of the Prix Goncourt des Lycéens, “created and organized by Fnac and the Ministry of National Education, under the patronage of the Académie Goncourt”, according to the official terms, took place on Monday in six cities in France : Lyon, Metz, Nîmes, Poitiers, Paris and Rennes. It is in the latter city that the winner was announced this Thursday.

In 2022, the Goncourt des Lycéens Prize was awarded to Sabyl Ghoussoub for her novel Beyrouth-sur-Seine (ed. Stock). In his third novel, this son of Lebanese exiles celebrates the story of his parents, settled in Paris since the civil war of 1975 but who nevertheless seem to have never really left Lebanon. And after immersing himself in the photos, correspondence and writings of his family, he paints a portrait of his loved ones, exalting the beauty of a generous mother, and the talent of a father, poet and director.