Childhood in the Algerian Novel: Reclaiming the Self and Constructing Memory

Abstract

This study seeks to examine the narrative function of childhood in the Algerian novel as a central signifying structure that transcends the boundaries of a passing theme, through a comparative critical reading organized into twelve sections combining theoretical framing (childhood in literary criticism, memory and identity, and autobiographical fiction) with an applied analysis of representative works from successive generations of Algerian novelists: from the founding generation (Mohammed Dib, Kateb Yacine, Malek Haddad, and Mouloud Feraoun), to women’s writing (Assia Djebar), the post-independence generation (Rachid Boudjedra and Rachid Mimouni), and the contemporary generation (Waciny Laredj). The study concludes that the Algerian novel employs childhood as a dual-function device: reclaiming the fragmented individual self on the one hand, and reconstructing the nation’s collective memory on the other, such that the child’s narrative biography cannot be separated from the biography of the nation itself throughout its colonial and postcolonial stages