At the invitation of the collection Ma Nuit au Musée (éd. Stock) – which has produced such little jewels as Jakuta Alikavazovic’s Like a Sky in Us and Lola Lafon’s Quand tu entendras cette chanson) – Mauritian writer Ananda Devi spent a night in Lyon’s Montluc Prison Museum.

The history of this prison, opened in 19221 and closed in 2009, reflects France’s darkest hours in the 20th century, when Resistance fighters, Jews including the children of Izieu, and Algerian independence fighters were imprisoned, tortured and sometimes executed. Common law prisoners were the last to be imprisoned there before it was closed in 2009, and the memorial opened.

This night in the Montluc prison becomes a real journey through the darkness of history, which the author makes no attempt to rank or compare. On the contrary, it’s their commonality that interests her: “the sacred wound” in the words of Aimé Césaire, i.e. the commodification of victims, the principle of dehumanization that lies at the heart of every humanitarian tragedy.

“In the infinite night of Montluc, night after night, the silence is like no other. It’s that of emptiness, of drowning breathless, when we finally understand that this sacred wound is the trampling of our tomorrows.”

La Nuit s’ajoute à la nuit by Ananda Devi, éd. Stock.
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Miriam Bridenne

After almost two decades of working in publishing, and a few round trips between Paris and New York, Miriam has decided to settle down at Albertine to do what she enjoys most: recommending books she loves. Somehow this also includes taking bizarre pictures for Albertine's social media outlets.

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