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L'art de perdre (Littérature française (12281)) (French Edition) Pocket Book – January 30, 2019

French Edition by Alice Zeniter (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 4,439 ratings
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L'Algérie dont est originaire sa famille n'a longtemps été pour Naïma qu'une toile de fond sans grand intérêt. Pourtant, dans une société française traversée par les questions identitaires, tout semble vouloir la renvoyer à ses origines. Mais quel lien pourrait-elle avoir avec une histoire familiale qui jamais ne lui a été racontée ? Son grand-père Ali, un montagnard kabyle, est mort avant qu'elle ait pu lui demander pourquoi l'Histoire avait fait de lui un "harki". Yema, sa grand-mère, pourrait peut-être répondre mais pas dans une langue que Naïma comprenne. Quant à Hamid, son père, arrivé en France à l'été 1962 dans les camps de transit hâtivement mis en place, il ne parle plus de l'Algérie de son enfance. Comment faire ressurgir un pays du silence ?
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  1. Print length
    608 pages
  2. Language
    French
  3. Publisher
    J'AI LU
  4. Publication date
    January 30, 2019
  5. Dimensions
    4.33 x 1.06 x 6.97 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    2290155152
  7. ISBN-13
    978-2290155158
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

L'Algérie dont est originaire sa famille n'a longtemps été pour Naïma qu'une toile de fond sans grand intérêt. Pourtant, dans une société française traversée par les questions identitaires, tout semble vouloir la renvoyer à ses origines. Mais quel lien pourrait-elle avoir avec une histoire familiale qui jamais ne lui a été racontée? Son grand-père Ali, un montagnard kabyle, est mort avant qu'elle ait pu lui demander pourquoi l'Histoire avait fait de lui un «harki». Yema, sa grand-mère, pourrait peut-être répondre mais pas dans une langue que Naïma comprenne. Quant à Hamid, son père, arrivé en France à l'été 1962 dans les camps de transit hâtivement mis en place, il ne parle plus de l'Algérie de son enfance. Comment faire ressurgir un pays du silence?

About the Author

Alice Zeniter est née en 1986. Elle a publié cinq romans, parmi lesquels Sombre dimanche (Albin Michel, 2013, prix du Livre Inter, prix des lecteurs de L'Express et prix de la Closerie des Lilas), Juste avant l'oubli (Flammarion, 2015, prix Renaudot des lycéens) et L'Art de perdre (Flammarion, 2017, prix littéraire du Monde et prix Goncourt des lycéens). Elle est dramaturge et metteuse en scène.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ J'AI LU (January 30, 2019)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ French
  • Pocket Book ‏ : ‎ 608 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 2290155152
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-2290155158
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 11.4 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.33 x 1.06 x 6.97 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 4,439 ratings

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Alice Zeniter

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
4,439 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

JDE
5.0 out of 5 stars Valuable history of French colonialism and Algerian history
Reviewed in the United States on March 23, 2018
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I liked this very much. I am so impressed that such a young author could have produced such a well-developed and detailed book. I am a francophile and am also very interested in the history of Algeria. In addition to providing interesting characters and plot, she also provided a valuable history of the colonial and post-colonial period. The book provides particular insights into the perspective of Algerians who were forced to abandon their country as a result of revolutionary violence, as well as the experience of those Algerians who supported the French, in whatever measure, and what their experience was as emigres in France.
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sybille schneider
4.0 out of 5 stars Re découverte d’une tranche de l’histoire française et algérienne
Reviewed in the United States on February 22, 2020
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Très belle écriture, avec des moments intimes et profonds sur l’immigration, la vie en France et une importante tranche histoire que je connaissais très mal
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Dennis Bougie
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent story of a family’s journey from Algeria to France
Reviewed in the United States on July 18, 2019
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I knew nothing of the history of Algeria and its war of independence from France. That history comes alive in the excellent depiction of a family who fled Algeria and were given French citizenship for their cooperation during the war. Never really accepted by the French and despised by Algerians who fought for their independence the family lives in limbo and not sure of their place in the world.
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Jonathan Benjamin
5.0 out of 5 stars A novel both personal and political
Reviewed in the United States on November 7, 2020
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Goes beyond the story of Franco-Algerian relations over three generations, to an intelligent and humane scrutiny of personal identity
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stephanie g.
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on March 11, 2018
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Magnifique écriture. Alice Zeniter fait partie de la cour des grands.
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M Prywes
5.0 out of 5 stars Identity is not one dimensional, it can’t be summarized as ‘Arab’ or ‘French’.
Reviewed in the United States on November 28, 2021
L’Art de Perdre (The Art of Losing) is an epic historical novel that follows a family of Harkis --Algerians who fought or worked for France during the Algerian Revolution of 1954-62. The family is also Kabyle, which is a Berber ethnic minority. After the French defeat in 1962, the vengeance of the Front de libération nationale (FLN) forces the family to flee to France. The French Government puts them in detention camps that resemble a prison, later it resettles them in an isolated labor camp where they work in forestry. Their grandchild, Naima, manages to become, through success in education, a Paris professional who works in an art gallery. She’s indifferent to her heritage, until the gallery director asks her to travel to Algeria to prepare a show. Piece by piece, she uncovers her family history.

This novel exerted a grip that kept me reading non-stop, The author is a powerful story teller although her French writing style is rather ordinary. The bruising strength of the novel lies in the drams of the historical event.

Most Americans know little about the ultra-violence of the Algerian Revolution, which may have killed from 300,000 to 1.5 million Algerians –no one really knows. Both the illegal French Organisation de l’armée secrete (OAS) and the FLN terrorized civilians with bloody public bombings, both committed assassinations.

An Algerian colleague told me how the French Army picked him off the streets of Algiers and imprisoned him overnight at age 9. He described listening, as a child, to the OAS set off bombs on his street. I met a Dutchman in the 1970s who had been a cash courier for the FLN. He passed easily since he was blond. He told me about his visit to post-revolution Algeria, where FLN officers boasted of slitting opponents’ throats. It was a bloodthirsty and disgusting war.

For France, the Algerian Revolution is as foundational as the Civil War is to understanding internal American divisions. The Algerian Revolution is connected to the non-integration of North African migrant populations. Discrimination against Algerians must explain a good part of youth unemployment problem in France. Moreover, the Algerian Revolution and the emigration of the French-Europeans (pieds noir) is a source of rise of the Far Right led by Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour

I appreciate the subtle way that Zeniter addresses the meaning of this history for the protagonist, Naima. Zeniter avoids the fashionable trop that chains ethnicity to identity and a homogeneous outlook. Instead this novel is about the complicated and contradictory ways that history influences identity.

Naima sets off to discover her family’s roots and discovers that her historical loyalties are to an independent Algeria and to her Kabyle culture, but also to Harki descendants and to France. Identity is not one dimensional, it can’t be summarized as ‘Arab’ or ‘French’. Yet Naima can never be fully French because of the way European French people respond to her Algerian appearance. She can never be fully Algerian because her Arabic is weak, because she’s abandoned the traditional female lifestyle, and also because she’s Kabyle and because her grandparents opposed the Revolution. Identity is like a bundle of feelings and loyalties and contradictions, bound into a single personality.

Note: This book is available in English translation English language edition under the title, The Art of Losing, (transl. Frank Wynne), New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 2021.
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Marie-Madeleine Moreaux
3.0 out of 5 stars Histoire familiale
Reviewed in Belgium on December 10, 2023
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Étant belge je ne connais guère l'histoire de l'Algérie j'ai eu un peu de mal....
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norbert
5.0 out of 5 stars très beau livre
Reviewed in Canada on August 4, 2018
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Très beau roman qui raconte l'histoire d'une famille algérienne sur trois générations, et qui débute peu avant la guerre d'indépendance.
Émouvant, lucide, sans parti pris, tout en nuances, et très bien écrit.
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Pedro de Andres Cairós
5.0 out of 5 stars Emocionante
Reviewed in Spain on January 15, 2020
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Un relato emotivo sobre varias generaciones, comenzando con la influencia de la historia sobre las personas, y terminando con la influencia de las personas sobre la historia. Muy bonito.
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lala
5.0 out of 5 stars Großartig!
Reviewed in Germany on November 10, 2019
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Eines der besten Bücher, die ich zum Thema Migration und Integration in den letzten Jahren gelesen habe, feine Sprache, spannend und unterhaltsam, das Thema ist aus der Sicht einer Enkelin sehr tiergehend und berührend erzählt. Ich habe mir gleich das nächste Buch von Alice Zenites bestellt.
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Suzie Kent
5.0 out of 5 stars What a wonderful book!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 2, 2019
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I have just finished reading this book, which I have scarcely been able to put down over the Christmas holidays. I think it’s one of the best books I’ve ever read. I loved the way we were able to get inside the heads of three generations of a family and gain an understanding the complexities and contradictions of what identity means. What is right and wrong in a conflict, and why do people do what they do? What are the long term effects of trauma and how do people cope? What does being « from » somewhere actually mean? The cognitive dissonance of many contradictory feelings and thoughts is also done incredibly well.

I now feel the loss that comes from having finished a great book, but will console myself with the knowledge that I can re-read it and that Alice Zeniter is a young author who no doubt will delight us with more books in the future. (No pressure!)

I hope an English translation is made so that the book reaches a non-Francophone audience, but of course no translation can do justice to the subtleties and richness of the original French. I am glad we have heard some different perspectives of Algeria and look forward to reading more of Alice’s work.
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