on a woman’s madness

BY astrid Roemer / translated from dutch by lucy scott

Finalist, National Book Award for Translated Literature

Winner, Dutch Literature Prize

Winner, P. C. Hooft Award

“Roemer makes her English-language debut with this classic of queer Black literature… As Roemer pushes at the boundaries of the senses, she melds biting postcolonial social commentary with a lush dreamscape. Scott’s translation is a gift to English-language readers.” —Publishers Weekly

On a Woman’s Madness tells the story of Noenka, a courageous Black woman trying to live a life of her own choosing. When her abusive husband of just nine days refuses her request for divorce, Noenka flees her hometown in Suriname, on South America’s tropical northeastern coast, for the capital city of Paramaribo. Unsettled and unsupported, her life in this new place is illuminated by romance and new freedoms, but also forever haunted by her past and society’s expectations.

Strikingly translated by Lucy Scott, Astrid Roemer’s classic queer novel is a tentpole of European and post-colonial literature. And amid tales of plantation-dwelling snakes, rare orchids, and star-crossed lovers, it is also a blistering meditation on the cruelties we inflict on those who disobey. Roemer, the first Surinamese winner of the prestigious Dutch Literature Prize, carves out postcolonial Suriname in barbed, resonant fragments. Who is Noenka? Roemer asks us. ‘I’m Noenka,’ she responds resolutely, ‘which means “Never Again.”’

Praise

‘Astrid Roemer’s writing, in Lucy Scott’s new translation, is lush and sinuous, turning quiet domestic scenes into dreamscapes and cranking up the volume on the many love stories this novel contains. It has taken far too long for On a Woman’s Madness to make it into English –don’t miss it now that it’s here!’ —Lily Meyer, NPR

‘Even as our protagnist Noenka worries she is incapable of truly loving others, she forges relationships of striking intensity–and on terms decidedly of her own choosing. Even as she’s weighed upon by ancestral and modern strictures Noenka boldly charts her path through mid-century Suriname...deliciously, sensuously dense.’ —Vox

‘The poetic writing can occasionally feel as impenetrable as the lush vegetation that fills several sets–but as deliciously, sensuously dense too. Read this first-ever English translation of a queer classic if you want to feel both the suffering and the promise of a life that is one’s own.’ —Caroline Houck, world politics senior deputy editor

‘A stunning tale of love and survival anchored by Noenka’s unflagging honesty and Roemer’s embrace of the contradictions, ambiguity, and mystery that character ize real life...The miracle of Roemer’s novel is not only the beauty with which she narrates Noenka’s life but also the strength of spirit displayed by her characters. Find ing beauty and love within any im prisonment is a glimpse of the divine in a person. Roemer’s novel glimmers with this holy light even in the darkest night.’ —Elizabeth Gonzalez James, Southwest Review

“Difficult, fragmentary, gorgeous, and at times unpredictable...The novel is saturated with pain, drama, pleasure, and violence, which may rightly invite comparison to classics by Gayl Jones, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker, although Roemer’s writing style is remarkable in its own right...The world Noenka lived in didn’t have room for her kind of love or personhood, and she suffered for it. Yet some how, by the end of the novel, Roemer’s heroine hasn’t abandoned the love she’s suffered for. This seems miraculous, and it is but one reason to be thankful for this long-over due translation of one of her most im por tant works.” —Harvard Review

“In On a Woman’s Madness freedom is not a place but an activity, a kind of restlessness that never settles into safety but still insists upon the necessity of its seek ing...The appearance of Roemer’s second novel in English is a ma jor hall mark for the study of con temporary Afrodiasporic literature, and Lucy Scott is to be commended for tackling Roemer’s unsettled and often unsettling prose.”—Nicholas Rine hart, Words Without Borders

CONTRIBUTORS’ DETAILS

In 1966, at the age of 19, Astrid Roemer emigrated from Suriname to the Netherlands. She identifies herself as a cosmopolitan writer. Exploring themes of race, gender, family, and identity, her poetic, unconventional prose stands in the tradition of authors such as Toni Morrison and Alice Walker. She was awarded the P.C. Hooft Prize in 2016, and the three-yearly Dutch Literature Prize (Prijs der Nederlandse Letteren) in 2021.

Lucy Scott is a translator of Caribbean literature written in Dutch and French. Her short story and essay translations thus far have appeared in Shenandoah: The Washington and Lee Review and in Wilderness House Literary Review. She’s the translator of Astrid Roemer’s On a Woman’s Madness and Off-White.

MORE INFORMATION

• Publication date: 15 October 2024

• Format: B-format paperback (198mm x 129mm)

• Extent: pp. 240

• Rights held: UK & Commonwealth

• ISBNs: 978-1-917126-07-6  (paperback)/ 978-1-917126-08-3(ebook)

• Price: £14.99 (paperback); £7.99 (ebook)