
Arabic As a Secret Song
Nine Narratives from the Life of an Exiled Artist
Leila Sebbar(Author)
University of Virginia Press
Will be published approx. on 17. June 2015
Book
Hardback
128 pages
978-0-8139-3756-4 (ISBN)
Description
The celebrated and highly versatile writer Leila Sebbar was born in French colonial Algeria but has lived nearly her entire adult life in France, where she is recognized as a major voice on the penetrating effects of colonialism in contemporary society. The dramatic contrast between her past and present is the subject of the nine autobiographical essays collected in this volume. Written between 1978 and 2006, they trace a journey that began in Aflou, Algeria, where her father ran a schoolhouse, and continued to France, where Sebbar traveled, alone, as a graduate student before eventually realizing her powerful creative vision.
The pieces collected in this book capture an array of experiences, sensations, and sentiments surrounding the French colonial presence in Algeria and offer an intimate and prismatic reflection on Sebbar's bicultural upbringing as the child of an Algerian father and French mother. Sebbar offers an unflinching portrait of her original disconnection from her father's Arabic language and culture; she goes on to describe her struggle to revive a cultural heritage that her family had deliberately obscured and translate into French the vibrant yet muted Arabic of her father and of Algeria. Looking back from numerous vantage points throughout her life, she presents the complicated and divisive dynamics of being raised ""between two shores""--the colonized and the colonizer.
The pieces collected in this book capture an array of experiences, sensations, and sentiments surrounding the French colonial presence in Algeria and offer an intimate and prismatic reflection on Sebbar's bicultural upbringing as the child of an Algerian father and French mother. Sebbar offers an unflinching portrait of her original disconnection from her father's Arabic language and culture; she goes on to describe her struggle to revive a cultural heritage that her family had deliberately obscured and translate into French the vibrant yet muted Arabic of her father and of Algeria. Looking back from numerous vantage points throughout her life, she presents the complicated and divisive dynamics of being raised ""between two shores""--the colonized and the colonizer.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Charlottesville
United States
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 140 mm
Thickness: 15 mm
Weight
271 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8139-3756-4 (9780813937564)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Leïla Sebbar
Arabic as a Secret Song
E-Book
06/2015
1st Edition
Naval Institute Press
from
€60.99
Available for download
Persons
Leila Sebbar is a prolific author whose works include essays, short fiction, plays, and film scripts, as well as the novels The Seine Was Red: Paris, October 1961; Silence on the Shores; and Sherazade, Missing: Age 17, dark curly hair, green eyes, among others. Born in Algeria, she lives and teaches in Paris, France.
Skyler Artes works as a translator and has lectured at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA and the University of Denver, USA.
Mildred Mortimer is Professor Emerita of French and French African Literature at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA.
Skyler Artes works as a translator and has lectured at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA and the University of Denver, USA.
Mildred Mortimer is Professor Emerita of French and French African Literature at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA.