My absence and others' absences

My absence from this blog, if anyone has noticed, is directly related to a wonderful project I've been working on.

Sorenne was born on December 7, 2008, and now that she's settling into her rhythm, I'm able to get back to writing about the Pieds-Noirs, exile, homeland, and nostalgia.

I'm currently working on a project for presentation at the Northeast Modern Language Association conference in Boston at the end of this month. "Dual, Doubled, and Divided Selves: Women Writing between Algeria and France," focuses on Marie Cardinal, Leïla Sebbar, and Hélène Cixous and how these women wrote multiple versions of themselves, each with a different strategy for representing her identity.

Although I won't have time to address it in this paper, I've also been thinking about language choice and how this has further divided authors like Sebbar and Assia Djebar (the subject of Névine El Nossery's talk on the same panel). Below is an interview with Sebbar on her work, Je ne parle pas la langue de mon père (Paris: Julliard, 2003).

I'm concurrently writing a book review of Assia Djebar edited by Najib Redouane and Yvette Bénayoun-Szmidt (Paris: Harmattan, 2008) for the French Review. It's taking an eternity (see above image of baby Sorenne), but the collection of essays is providing me with much to think about. Sebbar and Djebar have both stated that if they had chosen (or in the case of Sebbar, been able to) write in Arabic, they would not write at all. Djebar explains the risk of writing herself,

"Prendre conscience que l’écriture devient un dévoilement, cela m’a fait reculer. Je me suis remise en question: si je continue à écrire, je vais détruire ma vie car elle va être perturbée par l’écriture romanesque” (29).

and Sebbar focuses on her need for writing fiction,

“… me placer au cœur, au centre, dans la fiction fictionnelle, c’est me placer dans un lieu unitaire, rassembleur des divisions (…) pour moi, la fiction c’est la suture qui masque la blessure, l’écart entre les deux rives” (Lettres parisiennes, Paris: Barrault, 1986. 147).

For these women, the absence of their language and their separations became their source of expression.

Guerre d' Algerie la valise ou le cerceuil part 1

Guerre d' Algerie la valise ou le cerceuil part 1

In the fall edition of the Revue Diasporas: histoire et sociétés, I will have an article published on the theme of "La valise ou le cercueil" 'The suitcase or the coffin' in the Pied-Noir community. This video posted at Daily Motion explains, "C’est autour de ce mot d’ordre que s’est constituée le 11 février 1961, l’Organisation de l’armée secrète (OAS), mouvement d’extrême droite, se fixant un double objectif, conserver l’Algérie française et renverser le général de Gaulle et son régime."

Other video clips in the series:

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3ecfa_guerre-algerie-part-2

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3ecmp_guerre-algerie-part-3

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3edqh_guerre-algerie-part-4

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3eql5_guerre-dalgerie-part-5

part 6

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3uvko_guerre-dalg-la-valise-ou-le-cerceui_politics

part 7

http://www.dailymotion.com/nosctt/video/x3uvqn_guerre-dalgeriela-valise-ou-le-cerc_politics

Le 14 juillet 1962: un Français d'Algérie en parle

Grâce aux alertes de Google j'ai reçu un lien à cette vidéo. C'est un entretien avec un Français d'Algérie le 14 juillet 1962 qui a décidé de rester en Algérie après l'indépendance. Peut-être que mes contacts pieds-noirs me corrigeront, mais je ne l'appelle pas un Pied-Noir parce qu'il n'a pas quitté l'Algérie. Pour moi cet exil est un facteur important à l'identité des Pieds-Noirs. Ca ne veut pas dire que cet homme n'a pas connu un autre exil. Je suppose qu'il est devenu algérien en restant à Oran, mais il ne distingue que les Européens et les Musulmans.

Thanks to Google Alerts I received a link to this YouTube video. It's an interview with a Français d'Algérie on July 14, 1962 who decided to stay in Algeria after its independence. Maybe my Pied-Noir contacts will correct me, but I do not call this man a Pied-Noir because he didn't leave Algeria. For me, exile is a prime factor in Pied-Noir identity. That is not to say that this man didn't experience his own sort of exile. I suppose he became Algerian by staying in Oran, but I notice that in his vocabulary he only distinguishes between "les Européens" and "les Musulmans."

Si près

Hélène Cixous has written numerous things that have marked me, but lately I'm only interested in her remarks on Algeria. I'm reading Si près (Galilée, 2007) for a paper I'm writing on return narratives and her premise here is that she said to her 95 year old mother, "j'irai peut-être à Alger" (16). She expounds later on:

L'idée de vouloir revoir l'Algérie une dernière fois, celle-là je ne l'aurai en aucun cas. C'est une idée de mort. Cela voudrait dire que l'Algérie va mourir. Si des deux c'était moi qui allais mourir, je garderais naturellement ma mort pour moi. (42)