So Vast the Prison

by Assia Djebar

Book Overview

Paperback edition of the most ambitious work to date by the writer that many now consider to be North Africa's most important literary voice. It tells the story of a modern, educated algerian woman,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1583220674
• ISBN13: 9781583220672
• Release Date: May 2001
• Publisher: Seven Stories Press
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

So Vast the Prison

A somewhat difficult book to read, unless one is familiar with the French post-modernist style (Derrida, Cixous) however well worth the effort. This is an ambitious book that explores the power-relationships between men and women, husbands and wives, colonists and colonized, French and Arabs, Arabs and Berbers as well as the power implicit within spoken and written language, using a poetic, somewhat cinematic style (Djebar is also a film-maker)that meanders between what is apparently a semi-autobiographical narrative and (somewhat)straightforward historical writing, focusing on both modern and ancient Algeria.This is not a book that one can skim through and still understand: however the end result is insightful and haunting and leaves one wishing for more.