Julius-Caesar

Anne-Dauphine Julliand

(Les Arènes, 350 pages, 2019)

Julius-Caesar is a seven-year-old boy who lives with his family in Ziguinchor, Senegal. His athletic older brother and the local boys are all fervent soccer players, but Julius-Caesar must content himself with perfecting his foosball game. As everyone knows, Julius-Caesar is not an ordinary child. He visits the hospital weekly for dialysis treatments. His illness has now reached a critical stage. Without a kidney transplant, he will not survive much longer, and his father, Augustin, is the only viable donor.Augustin feels little affinity for his son, but out of duty and love for his wife, he agrees to take Julius-Caesar to France to undergo the surgery that may save his life.

Augustin conceals his resentment and reluctantly abandons his promising job. The money that he had saved in hopes of building a better home for his family is just enough to cover their flights to France. They will lodge for free with Tata Rosie in her apartment in the Parisian suburbs. As for the surgery itself, Augustin has a plan but only nine days to carry it out before his visa expires. Augustin thinks that the gravity of his son’s condition will convince the French doctors to speed up the transplant process. But he soon finds out that it will take much longer than the short visit he originally planned. Augustin must now swallow his pride and adapt to the humbling reality of working illegally.

Uprooted from their familiar surroundings, father and son each in their own way must overcome their fears and apprehensions, and tap into their own reservoirs of courage—with help at times from unexpected sources. Augustin, in spite of his frustration and discontent, finds small ways to ease his solitude in the company of a fellow countryman and his friends. Eventually, he confronts the ambivalent feelings he has for his young son who seems to be taking everything away from him: the comfort of his home, the warmth of his pregnant wife, the promise of his burgeoning career, and now his kidney. As for Julius-Caesar, his innocence and openheartedness protect him from the precariousness of their situation; he can melt the coldest of hearts, be it the heart of a curmudgeonly neighbor or a racist schoolteacher.

Alternating between the points of view of Julius-Caesar and Augustin, Anne-Dauphine Julliand portrays with understated acuity the intricacies of the father-son relationship. Through the illness of a child, this novel effectively questions our priorities in life and explores our common humanity.

Anne-Dauphine Julliand is a journalist who lives in Paris. She won critical acclaim and popular success with her first two books about the illness and death of her young daughter: Deux petits pas sur le sable mouillé (Les Arènes, 2011) and Une journée particulière (Les Arènes, 2013). In 2017, she also directed an award-winning documentary film, Et les mistrals, and in 2018, she founded the association What Really Matters. Julius-Caesar is her first novel.