ASSIA DJEBAR: écrivaine, cinéaste, intellectuelle, l’immortelle, nous a quitté | writer, cineaste, intellectual, has left us

ASSIA DJEBAR: écrivaine, cinéaste, intellectuelle, l’immortelle, nous a quitté | writer, cineaste, intellectual, has left us

Je me suis dit que la femme est privée d'image: on ne peut pas la photographier et elle même n'est pas propriétaire de son image. Parce qu’elle est enfermée, la femme observe l'espace interne, mais elle ne peut pas regarder l’espace extérieur, ou seulement si elle porte le voile et si elle regarde d’un seul œil. Donc je me suis proposé de faire de ma caméra l’œil de la femme voile.*

I thought to myself that the woman has been deprived of an image: She cannot be photographed, she does not even own her image. Since she is shut away, her gaze is on the inside. She can only look at the outside if she is veiled, and then, only with one eye. I decided then, that I would make of my camera this eye of the veiled woman.**

[Français] 

Assia Djebar (arabe : آسيا جبار), née Fatima Zohra Imalayène à Cherchell le 30 juin 1936 et morte le 6 février 2015 à Paris, historienne et une femme de lettres algérienne d'expression française, auteur de romans, nouvelles, poésies et essais. Elle a écrit également pour le théâtre, et a réalisé plusieurs films. Assia Djebar est considérée comme l'une des auteurs les plus célèbres et influentes du Maghreb. Elle est élue à l'Académie française en 2005.

Pendant une dizaine d'années, elle délaisse l'écriture pour se tourner vers un autre mode d'expression artistique, le cinéma. Elle réalise deux films, La Nouba des Femmes du Mont Chenoua en 1978, long-métrage qui lui vaudra le Prix de la Critique internationale à la Biennale de Venise de 1979 et un court-métrage La Zerda ou les chants de l'oubli en 1982.

[English]

Assia Djebar (Arabic: آسيا جبار), born Fatima Zohra Imalayène in Cherchell, Algeria on 30 June 1936 and died February 6, 2015 in Paris, She was an historian and a woman of Algerian literature of French expression, author of novels, poetry and essays. She has also written for the theater, and directed several films. Assia Djebar is considered one of the most famous and influential authors of the Maghreb. She was elected to the French Academy in 2005.

During a ten-year period, she stopped writing and turned to another mode of artistic expression, cinema. She directed two films, La Nouba des Femmes du Mont Chenoua (Songs of the women of Mont Chenoua) in 1978—a feature film which earned her the International Critics Prize at the Venice Biennale in 1979, and a short film La Zerda ou les chants de l'oubli (La Zerda or songs from oblivion), in 1982..

From Assia Djebar Blog

mercredi 30 juillet 2008

Albert Russo parle avec Assia Djebar

http://assiadjebar.canalblog.com/archives/2008/07/30/10079416.html

Assia Djebar, a novelist, short-story writer, playwright, director and poet from Algeria and France, received Belgium's prestigious Maeterlinck prize for her writing and film work in 1995. She also was named the 1996 laureate of the University of Oklahoma's $40.000 Neustadt International Prize for Literature.

Administered by the University of Oklahoma and its international quarterly, World Literature Today, the prize is awarded every two years by a jury of writers, critics and literary scholars from throughout the world. First presented in 1970 and endowed in 1992 by the Neustadt family of Ardmore, Oklahoma, the prize is the only international literary award emanating from the United States for which poets, playwrights and novelists are given equal consideration.

One indication of the prestige of the Neustadt  Prize is its record of 19 laureates, candidates or jurors who in the past 25 years have been awarded Nobel Prizes following their involvement with the Neustadt award.

In a phone interview, the laureate remarked: "I'm very touched because the situation of the writers in my country is now very unfortunate. I'm happy for my country and for my fellow writers."

Djelal Kadir, editor of World Literature Today and chairman of the Neustadt Prize Jury, explained "Assia Djebar is a Neustadt laureate in the best tradition of Neustadt laureates. She is a novelist, poet, filmmaker and former Neustadt juror.

Barbara Frischmuth, a writer and translator from Austria and membre of the 1996 Neustadt Prize jury who nominated Djebar for the honor, said, "Assia Djebar is one of the most outstanding prose writers I've ever read. She has succeded in transforming the history of the country and her gender in literature."

Djebar was born in 1936 in Algeria and was the first Algerian woman admitted to the prestigious Ecole Normale Supérieure de Sèvres in 1955. Since the early 1980s she has held a research appointment at the Algerian Cultural Center in Paris. Her novels include Les Enfants du nouveau monde(1962), Les Alouettes naives (1967), L'Amour, la fantasia (1985) and Ombre sultane (1987). Vaste est la prison and Le blanc d'Algérie followed in 1995 and early 1996, respectively.

Djebar's stories of two decades were collected in 1980 under the title Femmes d'Alger dans leur appartement, followed in 1991 by Loin de Medine, a volume of tales, narratives, scenes and recollections inspired by readings of Muslim historians who lived during the first centuries of Islam.

A collection of her verse appeared in 1969 as Poèmes pour l'Algérie heureuse. Djebar has directed several films, including the prize-winning La Nouba des femmes du Mont Chenoua (1977) and, more recently, La Zerda et les chants de l'oubli. La nouba was accorded a first prize at the Venice Film Festival. In 1990 she served as a member of the Neustadt Prize jury. She has been nominated for the 1996 award by the Austrian novelist Barbara Frischmuth.

The 1996 laureate was picked by an 11-person jury, which met at the university's Norman campus March 28 though 30. Each candidate was nominated by a member of the jury composed of writers from around the world. Albert Russo was one of them

*Benesty-Sroka, Ghila in "La Langue et l'exil", La Parole métèque, 21 (1992) cité dans Littérature et cinéma en Afrique francophone: Ousmane Sembene et Assia Djebar, textes recueillis par Sada Niang ed. (Paris: Harmattan, 1996). 

**Benesty-Sroka, Ghila, "La Langue et l'exil", La Parole métèque, 21 (1992): p. 24, cited in Littérature et cinéma en Afrique francophone: Ousmane Sembene et Assia Djebar by Sada Niang ed. (Paris: Harmattan, 1996). Translation by Beti Ellerson.

Also see, in French, Rencontre avec Assia Djebar by Sarah Maldoror.