How two eminent figures in Algerian literature used the written word to contribute to their country’s struggle for independence, justice, dignity, and national identity.

Mohamed Dib (1920-2003) was one of Algeria’s most celebrated novelists who wrote in French to reclaim his people’s literary voice. His novels exposed poverty and injustice under French colonial rule and embraced people’s aspirations for freedom. He was exiled from Algeria by the French authorities in 1959, and though he spent the rest of his life in Paris, Dib always carried his homeland in his heart and his work.

Abdelkader Alloula (1939-94) was an actor, playwright and director who reinvented traditional Algerian and North African storytelling in the form of powerful political theatre. His plays spoke out fearlessly against corruption and inequality, but when he remained in Algeria during the civil war of the 1990s, he was shot by two members of the Islamic Front for Armed Jihad in March 1994.