Assia Djebar
Algerian feminist novelist (1936–2015)
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Early life
Fatima-Zehra Imalayen or Djebbar was born on 30 June 1936 in Cherchell, Algeria, to Tahar Imalhayène and Bahia Sahraoui, a family of Chenouas Berber origin. She was raised in Cherchell, a small seaport village near Algiers in the province of Aïn Defla. Djebar's father taught French at Mouzaïaville, a primary school she attended. Later, Djebar attended a Quranic private boarding school in Blida, where she was one of only two girls. She studied at Collège de Blida, a high school in Algiers, where she was the only Muslim in her class. She attended the École normale supérieure de jeunes filles in 1955, becoming the first Algerian and Muslim woman to be educated at France's most elite schools. Her studies were interrupted by the Algerian War, but she later continued her education in Tunis.
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Career
In 1957, she chose the pen name Assia Djebar for the publication of her first novel, La Soif ("The Thirst"). Another book, Les Impatients, followed the next year. Also in 1958, she and Ahmed Ould-Rouïs began a marriage that would eventually end in divorce. Djebar taught at the University of Rabat (1959–1962) and then at the University of Algiers where she was made the department head for the French section.
In 1962, Djebar returned to Algeria and published Les Enfants du Nouveau Monde, and followed that in 1967 with Les Alouettes Naïves. She lived in Paris between 1965 and 1974 before returning to Algeria again. She remarried in 1980 to the Algerian poet Malek Alloula. The couple lived in Paris, where she had a research appointment at the Algerian Cultural Center.
In 1997, Djebar became the director for the Center of French and Francophone Studies at Louisiana State University. She held that position until 2001. In 1985, Djebar published L'Amour, la fantasia (translated as Fantasia: An Algerian Cavalcade, Heinemann, 1993), in which she "repeatedly states her ambivalence about language, about her identification as a Western-educated, Algerian, feminist, Muslim intellectual, about her role as spokesperson for Algerian women as well as for women in general."
In 2005, Djebar was elected to France's foremost literary institution, the Académie Française, an institution tasked with guarding the heritage of the French language and whose members, known as the "immortals", are chosen for life. She was the first writer from North Africa to be elected to the organization. and the fifth woman to join the academy. Djebar was a Silver Chair professor of Francophone literature at New York University.
Djebar was known as a voice of reform for Islam across the Arab world, especially in the field of advocating for increased rights for women.
Death
Djebar died in February 2015, aged 78 in Paris, France.
Awards
In 1985, she won the Franco-Arab Friendship Prize, for L'Amour la Fantasia.
In 1996, Djebar won the Neustadt International Prize for Literature for her contribution to world literature.
The following year, she won the Marguerite Yourcenar Prize.
In 1998, she won the International Prize of Palmi.
In 2000, she won the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade.
Tributes
On 30 June 2017, Google dedicated a Doodle to the novelist for the 81st anniversary of her birth. The Doodle reached all the countries of the Arab World. A library named after Djebar was opened in 2018 in the 20th arrondissement of Paris.