This book, number one in sales since it won the prestigious Prix Goncourt 2024 a few days ago, is controversial. Here’s why.
On November 4, we announced the winning book for the 2024 Goncourt Prize. We had four finalists who could potentially win the title. First of all, we had the book by Hélène Gaudi who was one of the outsiders of the title. Indeed, the author was unknown and the book was quite criticized on Babelio. We also had Madeleine Before dawn by Sandrine Collette, Jacaranda by Gaël Faye and Houris by Kamel Daoud.
It is the latter, already ranked among the favorites with Gaël Faye, who obtained other prestigious literary titles. Houris has also received other titles such as Landerneau price and the literary defector prize in the novel category. Prizes that only literary people know about, the Goncourt prize remaining the most prestigious. However, this book, which tells the “fictitious” story of an Algerian woman, is banned in Algeria.
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A poignant story that makes you react
Houris tells the story of a young deaf Algerian woman. The latter has scars. But on top of that, Fajr (main character’s first name) is pregnant. Convinced that it is a girl, she does not know if she should keep the baby. She lived in the 90s during the Algerian civil war and returns there to try to get answers about her past. This poignant novel is not the happiest, and makes for poignant reading, which makes it win awards. In addition, the subject remains recent and complicated to address.
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Moreover, it has been banned for sale in Algeria. For what ? Because it is forbidden to sell works there that evoke this famous period of civil war, also called dark decade. Indeed, it lasted from the end of 1991 to 2002, in which there was nearly 200,000 dead20,000 missing, 1.5 million displaced, damage estimated at nearly 20 billion dollars. Thus, this recent period remains relatively little discussed. But she would have been approached by another woman at the Daoud couple…
A case of plagiarism which gives him bad press
Everything seemed to be going well for the author of Houris. However, a history of plagiarism is said to be tarnishing the success of the award-winning author. Indeed, many Algerian media reveal that a woman accuses the author, as well as his wife, of having stole his personal history in order to make it the book that has been number one in sales since November 4. Her name is Saâda Arbane and her story troubles us as to its resemblance to the story of the heroine in Houris, the author’s book.
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According to Saâda Arbane’s statements, the book draws on the most intimate elements of her life: “the scar on her neck, the physical after-effects of a failed throat slitting, the absence of voice, the trauma of a family massacre, but also personal details such as her journey to the hospital, her care in France, or her relationship with her mother and the difficulties she encountered in surviving after the dark decade.” mondafrique tells us. She is said to have met Daoud’s wife, who is a psychiatrist, in the past. To be continued…
