Assia Djebar

Assia Djebar is the pen-name of Fatima-Zohra Imalayen (born August 4, 1936), an Algerian novelist, translator and filmaker. Most of her works deal with the obstacles faced by women, and she is noted for her feminist stance. Djebar is considered to be one of North Africa's most famous and influential writers, and was elected to the Académie française on June 16, 2005.

Early Life

Djebar was born in Cherchell, a small coastal town near Algiers. She attended the primary school where her father taught French, and attended secondary school elsewhere in Algeria. She was the first Algerian woman to be accepted at the École Normale Supérieure, an elite college in Paris.

Career

In 1957, she published her first novel, La Soif (The Mischief). (Fearing her father's disapproval, she had it published under the pen name Assia Djebar.) Another, Les Impatients, followed the next year. Also in 1958, she and Ahmed Ould-Rouïs began a marriage that eventually ended in divorce.

In 1962 Djebar published Les Enfants du Nouveau Monde, and in 1967 Les Alouettes Naives. She remarried in 1980, to the Algerian poet Malek Alloula; they live in Paris.

In 1996 she won the prestigious Neustadt Prize for Contribution to World Literature, and the next year, the Yourcenar Prize.

As of 2005, Djebar is the director of the Center for French and Francophone Studies at Louisiana State University.