Machaho Tellem Chaho

Algerian novelist Assia Djebar passed away one year ago, on 6 February 2015. Her novel Le Blanc d'Algérie (translated as Algerian White by David Kelley and Marjolihn De Jager) remains one of her must read.

Do you know Algerian novelist Chawki Amari? Have you heard of his latest novel The Dead Donkey (L'ane mort)? Here's my review of this novel, his latest, and a general overview of Amari's work on ArabLit : New Algerian Fiction: Up a Mountain with a Donkey in the Trunk .

If you haven't heard of the French craze around Boualem Sansal's latest novel, 2084: the end of the world, it's a good thing! If you'd like to read about it, and take a peak at what lays behind the story, read my latest review for ArabLit : Why Algerian Novelist Boualem Sansal’s ‘2084’ is a Sensation in France .

Algeria's Post Office services just issued on 21 september two stamps featuring two of the most important writers in Algerian literature : Abdelhamid Benhadouga and Mouloud Feraoun . These two stamps add to already existing collectibles featuring great Algerian literary figures  such as writers Kateb Yacine, Ahmed-Redha Houhou, poet Moufdi Zakaria and thinker Malek Bennabi.   On 16 April 2008, the Day of Knowledge in Algeria, Algeria's Post Office had issued a stamp for Benhadouga but had instead completely mixed itself up and had printed the portrait of writer Mohamed Dib under Benhadouga's name. This latest issue of Benhadouga's stamp comes, in 2015, to correct the mistake made in 2008, but will Mohamed Dib remain part of the collection under his rightful name and portrait?   These stamps are part of a larger series dedicated to memorable "men of culture" notably featuring the great painter...

This review originally appeared on El Watan 2014 .   "What are monkeys waiting for to turn into humans?" This question is the axis of Yasmina Khadra's new novel titled What are monkeys waiting for ( Qu'attendent les singes ) and it fits Algeria's current political situation well, with the presidential elections coming up and talks of a transition. But first, you might ask, who are the monkeys in question? Nora, chief inspector in Algiers' police force, is called one early morning to Bainem forest where a young girl has been found murdered, mutilated. Nora begins her investigation in a seemingly present-day Algiers, where the city's background are cursing taxi drivers and former hustlers turned power-holders. Its foreground, a corrupted Algerian press and a gangrened intellectual scene. With a will of steal, incorruptible and supported by a team of male colleagues only misogynist and homophobic on the surface, Nora begins investigati...

Do you know Johnny Cash's song I hung my head ? A man goes out to practice shooting, early one morning. Not paying particular attention to his surroundings, he fires into the distance and his bullet shoots a rider down. I always felt this song captures the fixed and unforgiving essence of doom, how one single moment, one single action, can make your entire life tip over, to merge the real and the nightmares. Perhaps we've all been at the threshold of such moments? Perhaps not. But it is the kind of texts that sends ice cold waves down one's spine (well mine), because it tells and foretells life's potential for horror.  Abdelhamid Ben Hadouga's novel ' The South Wind ' sends such shivers, only they will be burning, as burning as the guebli- wind. The story is set post-independence (the novel was published in 1971) and the Algerian government is about to implement its land redistribution plan. Nafissa, a young university student, returns to...

A trois degré vers l’est (Three degrees East) is Chawki Amari's second short-story collection, and was published in 2008 by Chihab editions .

Chawki Amari published his novel Nationale 1 ( Highway 1 ) in 2007. In it, he recounts the story of Kalim and his car Taos, both leaving Algiers to go and see Boudjemaa. He heads to In Guezzam, Algeria's furthest point South knowing that "Boudjem3a is not waiting in In Guezzam". Nationale 1 is also the story of Algeria, and the magic of its topography. Algeria is around 2,4 million km2. It is the 11 th biggest country in the world. North-South, it begins from a coastal area with its toes in the Mediterranean, continues South, past the Tropic of Cancer, further than NATO's geographic limits for member countries, and finishes at In Guezzam, because, once upon a time, not so long ago, the coloniser's ball pen marked a spot on a map, to keep to himself underground water resources, otherwise rare in the area. Algeria's topographic variety is bewildering. Its upper area is contoured by the sea, its lower body by the third largest desert on earth...

" Ombre Absurde in Days colour of the sun ( Jours coleur de soleil ) OMBRE ABSURDE acharnée à ma masturbation ma mort mon suicide détramé. Débris de moi Débris de rien Debout sur mon cadavre JE VOUS SALUE fascinantes morgues de mon delirium QU'ON M'EMPILE après tout qu'on change les DRAPS. QU'IL NE DEMEURE en moi que la trace de ton CORPS." *** Algerian poet Djamal Amrani was born in 1935, in Sour-El-Ghozlane , and passed away in 2005.  He wrote in French and published 16 poetry collections, one novel and one theatre play.  He participated in the struggle against France during the war of independence, and in the Battle of Algiers in 1957 - he was caught and tortured for a month. He was then released and sent in exile in Paris.  When independence was won, the Algerian government mandated him to be Algeria's ambassador in Cuba.  His first book The Witness was published in 1960.  In 2004, he was awarded ...

"I Arabise the Italian and Italianise the Arabic." Amara Lakhous. Amara Lakhous was born in Algiers, in 1970. He writes in Italian now, but he wrote his first novel(s) in Arabic. His first novel was published in Italy as a bilingual edition ( Le Cimici e Il Pirata - the Bug and the Pirate ) . He is Kabyle and polyglot (Kabyle, Arabic, French, Italian) and currently based in Rome. He studied Philosophy in Algiers and emigrated in Italy, Rome, in 1995.  Of his leaving Algeria he said "I was tired of waiting for my murderers".  Another Black Decade, or red Decade,   exil é .   In Italy, he earned a second degree in Cultural Anthropology, writing about Muslim-Arab immigrants in Italy and this is may have given birth to this second novel. Scontro di civiltà per un ascensore a Piazza Vittorio was published in 2006 in Italy and was published in translation in English in 2008 as Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio (tran...

Aziz Chouaki is an Algerian novelist and playright who writes in French.  Born in 1951. Translated in English, notably The Star of Algiers (L'étoile d'Alger) published in French in 2002 by Editions Balland, its translation in 2005 by Grayworld Press. Two translators worked on the English version of The Star of Algiers : Ros Schwartz, who specialises in translating French fiction, and Lulu Norman who specifically translates North African authors.  This is the best translation of a North African francophone author that I have come across so far and this must be due to two minds peering over the draft from their own speciality's perspective. I've just finished reading it and it has torn my soul to pieces, as every time I read novels from Algerian authors writing about Algeria. It's just so damn raw and real and tender and gutwrenching and honourable and humane and alive and....  Algerian fiction is closer to first-hand witness accounts of the modern hi...

Ce droit de vivre de poser une pierre de couper la toile d'araignée où je me démène me le donneras-tu ? Ce droit de défense et d'insulte des crétins je l'exige sans retenue j'en userai sans sobriété Puis-je entrer dans cette citadelle ? Puis-je traverser ce pont-levis ? Fraternellement très poliment j'accept ce coup de pied. Youcef Sebti Algerian poète and writer Poème extrait de L'enfer et la folie