Boualem Sansal is the Arab world’s most courageous and controversial novelist. His first novel to appear in English (An Unfinished Business/The German Mujahid, Bloomsbury/Europa) was the first work of fiction by an Arab writer to acknowledge the Holocaust in print. He started writing novels at the age of 50, shortly after retiring as a high-ranking official in the Algerian government. He was awarded the prestigious Prix du Roman Arabe in 2012, and the German Peace Prize in 2011.
Algeria
Boualem Sansal
All Boualem Sansal's books
Latest reviews
![]()
This is a tribute to Orwell’s classic Nineteen Eighty-Four – set in the distant future, 2084 presents itself as a cry of protest against totalitarianism of all kinds. In this time, citizens submit to a single god, free thoughts and remembering are forbidden, and surveillance...— Turnaround Blog, Dec 11 2017![]()
As its title suggests, Boualem Sansal’s award-winning 2084: The End of the World takes some of its inspiration from George Orwell’s 1984. Sansal keeps some of the details of his futuristic setting intentionally obscured until late in the book – this is a novel told from...— Signature, Jul 29 2017![]()
Sansal is our guide into absurdity and out of it, the perfect guide through the fear and laughter we expend reading 2084.— Rain Taxi Summer, Jun 13 2017![]()
PERHAPS YOU’VE HEARD: since the election of Donald Trump, sales of Orwell’s 1984 have skyrocketed. The American literary community has long had a reputation for being insular and neglectful of translated works, so while it’s endearing that many Americans are turning to...— Front Porch Journal, May 11 2017![]()
2084: The End of the World (Europa Editions) is only the second novel by the Algerian Boualem Sansal to be translated into English. Sansal is one of the most revered Francophone novelists living in Algeria today, a resonant fact in a country where writers and journalists in the...— Fiction Writers Review, May 11 2017![]()
On both the left and the right, the grand old parties of yore have been shattered, discredited. The reshuffling of France’s political life is like spring cleaning— The New York Times, May 8 2017![]()
2084: The End of the World (Europa Editions) is only the second novel by the Algerian Boualem Sansal to be translated into English. Sansal is one of the most revered Francophone novelists living in Algeria today, a resonant fact in a country where writers and journalists in the...— Fiction Writers Review, Apr 3 2017![]()
Boualem Sansal’s prophetic novel very clearly derives its lineage from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. A totalitarian surveillance state, a fundamentalist religious autocracy, is portrayed as being totally intolerant of free-thinkers. This is a powerful satire on an...— The Spectator, Mar 23 2017![]()
Alison Anderson’s deft and intelligent translation of 2084 helps to overcome such binary thinking by conveying Sansal’s abhorrence of a system that controls people’s minds, while explaining that the religion was not originally evil but has been corrupted.— The Times Literary Supplement, Mar 1 2017![]()
If the reasons for1984 currently topping the American best-seller lists are unsettling for you, then Sansal’s reboot, 2084, will likely prove downright unnerving. His world is uncannily familiar with its separation walls, bans on other cultures and religions, and a totalitarian...— Words Without Borders, Feb 27 2017![]()
In this reworking of Nineteen Eighty-Four, dystopian England is represented by a North African caliphate, Big Brother by the prophet Bigaye and Winston Smith by Ati. Life in Abistan brings surveillance, suppression of independent thought and the beheading of heretics. However,...— The New Statesman, Feb 15 2017![]()
The title “2084: The End of the World” was what intrigued me and I knew I would love reading this book. I think as you age, you also become a little more discerning about what you read. What is also true is that what you read is a reflection of your personality to some extent,...— The Hungry Reader, Feb 13 2017![]()
In more than a nod to Orwell, Algerian author Boualem Sansal’s 2084 depicts life under a totalitarian regime of religious fanaticism. In the novel’s fictional country, Abistan, religion is law, life, and death, and all notions of a past before the birth of the nation have...— nathanieldennettdotcom, Feb 12 2017![]()
This powerful book from one of the Arab world’s most controversial novelists follows two friends in a totalitarian state as they uncover cracks in their world— The Guardian, Feb 12 2017![]()
A powerful book against totalitarianism in all its forms whether eastern or western!— Winstonsdad's Blog, Jan 30 2017![]()
Alison Anderson interviewed on BBC World Service— BBC, Jan 29 2017![]()
The true subject of science fiction is always the present. Its imagined futures are mirrors to today’s hopes and fears. George Orwell’s 1984 simply shifted the numbers of the year in which he wrote the book – 1948 – and made a metaphor of that time’s dark politics.— The National, Jan 26 2017![]()
In 2084: The End of the World, Algerian novelist Boualem Sansal imagines a dystopian world ruled by one religion in the name of its almighty prophet. Unanimously praised for its literary merits, his barely veiled Orwellian parody of Islam has sparked controversy among the liberal...— Exberliner, Sep 1 2016
Algeria
