A book festival open to Africa, for connoisseurs and the uninitiated

In the common African tradition, artistic expression has always been intended to be multidisciplinary. For this reason, the Marrakech African Book Festival (FLAM) aims to be a space of literature, around which various forms of creation will flourish, graft on to each other and ultimately break down the barriers between disciplines. More than a book fair, the third edition of the event, from January 30 to February 2, 2025, gives pride of place to novelists, essayists and poets from all over Africa, but also researchers, thinkers and Afro-descendant public figures, known in particular for their political action.

Beyond literature, the organizers are breaking down the barriers between artistic expressions and meeting formats, which are intended to be inclusive and widely open. Designed as a space for exchange where fine connoisseurs mingle with the uninitiated, emerging talents, schoolchildren, students and the youngest, this annual meeting allows the exchange and debate of ideas to shine. from the continent, the organizers announced this Thursday, during the presentation of the axes of this edition.

At the Les Étoiles cultural center of Jamaa El Fnaa and the French Institute of Marrakech, this third FLAM will highlight the writing and intellectual contribution of women in Africa, both in literature, reflection and in terms of participation public, notably through political action. “Their voice, although essential, is often silenced. However, it is they who carry the memories and hopes of our societies, who reinvent the world every day in their gestures and their words. And this is even more true in Africa and within its diasporas,” underline the organizers.

Make authors visible and involve young people

General delegate of FLAM, Younès Ajarraï declared to Yabiladi that this is the approach advocated by the festival since its creation, because “we cannot live without culture” in its broad sense. In addition to literary meetings, book presentations and thematic debate panels, the objective is to include students and young readers.

“Culture is not intended to be limited to a certain elite. Our festival defends this idea, because I believe in cultural mediation, so we are going to see young people where they are, because we want them to meet writers they have never met in their schools, to know the authors of African literature,” Younès Ajarraï told us.

Among the meetings planned with authors, the third edition of FLAM notably renews the format of literary breakfasts at the Les Etoiles Center in Marrakech, in addition to master classes, writing workshops and off-site interventions, in school and university environment. From now on, FLAM also sponsors the Literary Prize for Marrakech high school students. “In our concern for sharing, entry is free and without reservation and all meetings are broadcast live and streaming on our social networks and subsequently archived on our YouTube channel,” say the organizers.

In figures, Younès Ajarraï reminds our editorial team that last year’s edition allowed 3,000 young people to benefit from meetings with an author, “around a literary breakfast during which we sit down at a ‘mida’ to exchange with a writer, who we have to eat, of our own,” he underlines, evoking the educational impact on the personal development of schoolchildren in public and private establishments. Also at FLAM 2024, 25 authors took part.

Ph. FLAM

More broadly, the first edition of FLAM attracted 8,000 festival-goers. During the second, 10,000 were exceeded. Beyond the school environment, activities affect higher education, through Cadi Ayyad University and UM6P, but also the fabric of civil society, associations, as well as the homes of young rural girls.

At the heart of FLAM’s activities, Younès Ajarraï above all carries the idea of ​​accessibility to culture for all, but with everyone’s contribution to this effect. “Beyond this vocation to elevate the soul and educate people, when you read, you listen to music, you go to the cinema, you encounter different imaginations, you enter the world of others and therefore of knowledge of the other, that is to say of the human being who is not the same as you,” he tells us.

For accessibility that knows no borders, the activities of all FLAM editions are broadcast in streaming, which makes it possible to follow the conferences around the world. “The numbers are excellent, with thousands and thousands of views on our YouTube channel and the different platforms, throughout the year. The memory and the archives are there and remain consultable,” adds the general delegate.

Archive / Ph. FLAM

Changing perceptions of literature and creation in Africa

Teacher and researcher in the department of French language and literature at Cadi Ayyad University in Marrakech, specializing in sub-Saharan African novels, Hanane Essaydi is the co-founder of FLAM. For her, this event is inseparable from what she considers to be her “daily battle”, both in the amphitheater and outside the walls. “My thesis focused on the use of humor and irony in the African novel. Through this, I was able to better understand the history of the continent and through that, even understand my place as an African woman, become aware of historical injustices and oppressions,” she told Yabiladi.

“It changed my imagination, my way of seeing things and my outlook on this other part of my African continent. This is what I try to do with university students, but also with these young people whom I put around tables with authors who talk to them about these continental realities,” underlines the researcher. According to her, “young people discover what we share and have in common and that beyond differences, the idea that we share our humanity”.

Archive / Ph. FLAM

It is with this in mind that FLAM is in line with the action program of its organizers, the members of the WE Art AFRICAN//NS association. The objective remains to promote reading, literature and culture in the broad sense, to create “real reunions with our continent, our common Home, for the global development of arts and culture”.

This vision is rich in the “historical and heritage roots of our country and of Marrakech in particular”, as a city “heir to the Moroccan golden age”, with its great potential to “recreate a contemporary Africa where religions, languages ​​and cultures, in their diversity, each in its singularity, combine in the same quest for beauty and universal values.