From Tahar Djaout's "No" to Mustapha Benfodil's "Enough!"

Twenty-five years before Tahar Djaout's death, the Algerian poet, journalist, dramaturge, and activist Mustapha Benfodil was born in western Algeria. The year was 1968, a year of great turmoil and upheaval on cultural, economic, social, and political levels the world round. Benfodil began life in a revolutionary moment, and such a spirit continues to guide and inform his work today. The same year that Djaout was assassinated, Benfodil paid tribute to him in a poem entitled, "À la santé de la République". This poem connects the two authors and public intellectuals textually in an immediate and evident way. And yet the parallels between the writers, especially concerning the theme of revolution and the artist's relationships with society, the state, and religion, run deep. This article examines the revolutionary content, tone, and approach of both Djaout and Benfodil through the study of revolutionary poetry by the former and an artistic installation, entitled Maportaliche/Écritures sauvages, by the latter. In this revolutionary aesthetic tradition, the stakes of the artist/intellectual/activist's work take on heightened significance, just as this figure finds itself alternatively lionized or censored

Art · Humanities · Hispanic-African Historical Relations · Multiculturalism, Politics, Migration, Gender · North African History and Literature

• L’écriture en strates ou le chaos annoncé dans Body writing, vie et mort de Karim Fatimi, écrivain, de Mustapha Benfodil

  Open Access•Saliha Rachedi, Mounya Belhocine•Multilinguales•2022

  Add to list

• Women Living Under Muslim Laws

  Marie-Aimée Hélie-Lucas•Comparative Studies of South Asia…•1990

  Add to list