Zeinab Laouedj - Algerian poet

Algerian poet Zeinab Laouedj was born in 1954, in Maghnia (Tlemcen). She writes in Arabic and is translated in French (all be it seldom). I have not found her translated in English.

The latest French translation of her work I've found is in this collection of texts by Algerian writers and poets called Paroles d'Algériens : Ecrire pour résister dans l'Algerie du XXè Siècle (2003).

In the above collection, you can find her poem 'Le Palmier' [The Palm Tree] dedicated to Abdelkader Alloua, the Algerian playwright assassinated on 10 March 1994, and to the poet Youcef Sebti assassinated on 27 December 1993:

"Mon pays	My country
Je suis un Lion	I am a Lion
Et je vous ferai trembler	And I will make you tremble
Jusque dans vos forêts	Up til your forests
Moi le Fou	Me, the Crazed
Fou par amour de sa patrie	Mad for the love of his land
Où nul fou	Where no other madman
Ne me ressemble	Resembles me

Ma	My
Stature	Stature
Est grande	Stands tall
Votre	Your
Tombe	Grave
Ne peut	Cannot
La contenir ...	Contain it…

La terre tourne	The earth turns
Même allongé	Even lying

Je	I
Suis
Dressé	Rise
Tel	Like
Un	A
Palmier	Palmtree
Dans	In
L'humus	The soil
De la terre."	Of the earth.
Zineb Laouedj	(Eng. trans. by Nadia Ghanem)

Zeinab Laouedj is married to Algerian novelist Waciny Laredj. If you are in Algiers, you can find her poetry collections in the Librairie du Tiers-Monde (at the very bottom of the "Algerian Lit in Arabic" section, at the very back of the "poetry in Algerian" section , above the dust).

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