Algerian-born writer and filmmaker Djebar, now living in France,
makes her American debut with a collection offering memorable
portraits of Arabic women in a time of change. Spanning the years
1958 to 1979, a period when Algeria fought a bitter war of
independence from France and experienced a socialist revolution,
Djebar's stories are intended to be "the voice of all the women
they've kept walled in" in Islamic societies. As Sarah, who had
been badly wounded while fighting, observes (in the title story):
"There is only one way to unblock everything - talk without
stopping about yesterday and today, talk among ourselves in all the
women's quarters, the traditional ones as well as those in housing
projects and look. Look outside the walls." And this Djebar does,
as she chronicles the changing role of Arabic and Algerian women
during those tumultuous years. When the promised equality of the
revolution is soon diluted by the return of old Islamic
proscriptions, the narrator of "Forbidden Gaze, Severed Head" says,
"What words had uncovered in times of war is now being concealed
underneath a thick coveting of taboo" - again, women, once the
"bombcarriers and sister-companions of the nationalist heroes,"
must hide behind veils and walls. Pieces like "Nostalgia of the
Horde," in which an old woman recounts her harsh treatment as a
12-year-old bride; "Ramadan," in which a young woman is upset at
the return of "interminable formulas of politeness"; and "There is
No Exile," in which a grieving woman who lost her children and
husband in the war is forced by her family to remarry - all reflect
the continuing, often stifling power of older women and family. As
much a critique as a picture of a society, Djebar's debut - plus
its informative afterword - is an elegant and evocative
introduction to a too little-known world. (Kirkus Reviews)
The cloth edition of Assia Djebar's Women of Algiers in Their
Apartment, her first work to be published in English, was named by
the American Literary Translators Association as an ALTA
Outstanding Translation of the Year. Now available in paperback,
this collection of three long stories, three short ones, and a
theoretical postface by one of North Africa's leading writers
depicts the plight of urban Algerian women who have thrown off the
shackles of colonialism only to face a postcolonial regime that
denies and subjugates them even as it celebrates the liberation of
men. Denounced in Algeria for its political criticism, Djebar's
book quickly sold out its first printing of 15,000 copies in France
and was hugely popular in Italy. Her stylistically innovative,
lyrical stories address the cloistering of women, the implications
of reticence, the connection of language to oppression, and the
impact of war on both women and men. The Afterword by Clarisse
Zimra includes an illuminating interview with Djebar.
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