Amara Lakhous: The Fertility of Evil w/ Mariagrazia De Luca
A criminal investigation plumbs the seedy underbelly of Oran in this heady psychological thriller spanning the history of postcolonial Algeria.
Oran, July 5, 2018. Independence Day. Colonel Soltani of the Anti-Terrorism Unit reluctantly gives up his holiday after his superior officer tracks him down at his girlfriend’s home. A former National Liberation Front fighter and Algerian power broker has been found dead, his throat slit and face mutilated. Pressured to close this high-profile case quickly, Soltani and his team delve into the victim’s past from the 1950s, uncovering the secrets of a revolutionary cell whose three remaining members have become prime suspects.
Set in a post-independence era marred by corruption, this dark, captivating novel unfolds in contrasting landscapes of dilapidated historic quarters and opulent new districts, revealing Algeria’s struggle against deceit and betrayal.
Amara Lakhous was born in Algeria in 1970 and lived in Italy for eighteen years before moving to the United States in 2014. A bilingual novelist in Arabic and Italian, he is the author of Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio, a bestseller translated into ten languages and adapted into a film in 2010. He is currently a professor in the practice in the Department of Italian Studies at Yale University.
Mariagrazia De Luca is a PhD candidate in the Department of Italian Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. She is currently writing her dissertation on translingualism across Italian contexts, reflecting on how languages move across and beyond borders, while at the same time prompting us to reconsider and redefine the very notion of “border” and national identity. Her previous work includes a chapter in The Routledge Handbook of Literary Translingualism (2021), titled “Literary Translingualism in the Italian Context: Toward a New Debate on the Italian Language,” as well as an essay on the reception of Dante among Somali writers, “From Forced Readers to Freedom Writers: Responding to Dante in Postcolonial Somalia,” published in Dante Studies (2020). She holds degrees in Italian literature from Sapienza University of Rome and in English from the City College of New York.
Istituto Italiano Scuola (IIS) in San Francisco, founded in 1998, is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting Italian language and culture in Northern California and beyond through special events, workshops, and Italian language courses.
The institute offers nearly 70 courses per term for all levels, from beginners to advanced, covering grammar, conversation, literature, Italian for travelers, and citizenship test preparation, available both online and in person. IIS also aims to build a community of individuals connected to Italy, extending these opportunities to everyone, not just San Francisco residents.
