Cultural figures gathered at the Avignon Festival to pay tribute to Algerian-born writer Boualem Sansal, sentenced to five years in prison in Algeria. A public reading of his works was held to denounce what many called an unjust sentence.
Several cultural figures, including the president of the Avignon Festival, paid tribute on Wednesday to French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, who was sentenced to five years in prison in Algeria. The tribute took place during an evening of readings from his works, AFP observed.
The 80-year-old author has been imprisoned in Algeria for over seven months on charges of “undermining national unity.” His sentence was upheld on appeal on July 1 and he was excluded from a presidential pardon granted last week on the 63rd anniversary of Algeria’s independence.
“This is about honoring a voice (...) unjustly imprisoned,” said Tiago Rodrigues, president of the Avignon Festival, in front of some 130 attendees. He added, “We hope we can welcome him at a future edition of the Avignon Festival.”
For about an hour, journalist and essayist Laure Adler, historian Patrick Boucheron, president of the Arab World Institute Jack Lang, Franco-Iranian writer Delphine Minoui, theater director Gwenaël Morin, and Mr. Rodrigues each read one or more excerpts from Sansal’s books.
Passages were drawn from Avoir vingt ans (1969), The Barbarians’ Oath (1999), Rue Darwin (2011), and Letter of Friendship, Respect and Warning to the Peoples and Nations of the Earth (2021).
At the end of the reading, a member of the author’s support committee, Nicole Raffin, stood up and declared: “A reading is nice, but action is better (…) Let’s fight for Boualem Sansal’s freedom!” She later told the press that the movement remained too “confidential.” “It’s still too much of a quiet, insiders-only effort,” she lamented.
“The Festival wanted this tribute to share Boualem Sansal’s literary power. It was the most meaningful way to express our solidarity and turn our commitment into something tangible,” Rodrigues told AFP.
The novelist and essayist was convicted, in part, for remarks made in October 2024 during an interview with the far-right French outlet Frontières, in which he argued that Algeria inherited land under French colonial rule that historically belonged to Morocco.
With AFP
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