Readers are likely familiar with the self-immolations among Algerians (and others in the region) this year. The following is a translation of Algerian journalist and author Kamel Daoud’s 9 October, 2011 column. Translator and TMND reader Suzanne Ruta provides the introduction and translation from French below.
- Kal
Kamel Daoud is an award winning Algerian author and journalist. He writes a popular column in the daily Le Quotidien d’Oran raina raikoum (my opinion, your opinion). His retelling of Camus’ The Stranger from the point of view of the surviving brother of the unnamed Arab shot at midday on an Oran beach, will be published next year in France and Algeria, under the title Le Contre-Meursault.
In early October, in Oran, a thirty year old single mother of two set herself on fire when she faced eviction from her apartment. The policeman who tried to save her and the woman herself died of injuries sustained. Her three year old son was badly burned. The same week, also in Oran, a nineteen year old set himself on fire in the courtyard of the lycee where he was denied the right to enroll for makeup classes.
There have been dozens of suicides and attempted suicides by fire in Algeria in the last year. In Tunisia, one man’s desperate act sparked a revolution. In Algeria the situation is decidedly different, for reasons Daoud analyzes in his daily column with tragic clarity, concluding, ‘Suicide may often be a crime of the group against the individual.’ Continue reading
