Writer and essayist whose writings sing of the dialogue between cultures, the pleasure of openness to others and the importance of overcoming murderous identities.
Biography:
War forced Amin Maalouf to flee his native Lebanon with his young family in 1976, when he was the director of an international weekly. He then worked as a Grand Reporter, then Editor-in-Chief for Jeune Afrique for 10 years, until he devoted himself full-time to his first novel, Léon l'africain, released 3 years after his first book: Les croisades vues par les arabes.
In all his writings, he has never ceased to awaken his readers to the need for dialogue between people of different cultures, a dialogue and also an appreciation that can be woven naturally between people open to overcoming cultural barriers and obstacles. A need that is becoming urgent, as he describes in his essay Le dérèglement du monde (2009).
In everything I write, I feel I'm fighting a battle, my battle, which has always been the same. Against discrimination, against exclusion, against obscurantism, against narrow identities, against the so-called war of civilizations, and also against the perversities of the modern world, against hazardous genetic manipulation... Patiently, I strive to build bridges, attacking the myths and habits of thought that fuel hatred... It's a lifelong project that continues from book to book, and will continue for as long as I am able to write.
Amin Maalouf vibrates with a multiplicity of origins, cultures and religions (Arabic, French, Lebanese, Turkish, Egyptian, American, various Christian rites, etc.). His books have been translated into 37 languages.
He was elected to the Académie Française in 2011.
