Synopses & Reviews
Uncivil War is a provocative study of the intellectuals who confronted the loss of Frances most prized overseas possession: colonial Algeria. Tracing the intellectual history of one of the most violent and pivotal wars of European decolonization, James D. Le Sueur illustrates how key figures such as Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Germaine Tillion, Jacques Soustelle, Raymond Aron, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Albert Memmi, Frantz Fanon, Mouloud Feraoun, Jean Amrouche, and Pierre Bourdieu agonized over the “Algerian question.” As Le Sueur argues, these individuals and others forged new notions of the nation and nationalism, giving rise to a politics of identity that continues to influence debate around the world. This edition features an important new chapter on the intellectual responses to the recent torture debates in France, the civil war in Algeria, and terrorism since September 11.
Review
"Mouloud Feraouns Journal is a precious account not only of the social, political, and military conditions in revolutionary Algeria, but also of a man whose dedication and dignity transcended the atrocity and absurdity of his times. This unsettling yet inspiring book is highly recommended for general as well as specialized collections."—Phillip Naylor, The Journal of Military History Nicole Kaplan - North African Studies
Review
"Mouloud Feraoun's Journal is a precious account not only of the social, political, and military conditions in revolutionary Algeria, but also of a man whose dedication and dignity transcended the atrocity and absurdity of his times. This unsettling yet inspiring book is highly recommended for general as well as specialized collections."-Phillip Naylor, The Journal of Military History(Phillip Naylor, The Journal of Military History)
Review
"Mouloud Feraoun's Journal is a precious account not only of the social, political, and military conditions in revolutionary Algeria, but also of a man whose dedication and dignity transcended the atrocity and absurdity of his times. This unsettling yet inspiring book is highly recommended for general as well as specialized collections."-Phillip Naylor, The Journal of Military History(Phillip Naylor, The Journal of Military History)
Review
“Uncivil War is indispensable reading for re-assessing the greater historical significance of the Algerian War.”—Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations
Review
"Feraoun was great novelist and an educator in the colonial system until his assassination by the OAS, a right-wing French terrorist group, just three days before a cease-fire ended Algerias eight-year battle for independence from France in 1962. His first entry, from November 1, 1955, prefigures the complexity, irony, and compassion that dictate the intellectual rigor and honesty of his lifes work . . . In passage after passage, Feraouns Journal reads like a message in a bottle. Far beyond the particulars of Algeria, it is precisely this gesture that makes Feraouns Journal such a timely and timeless historical, political, literary, and human document."—Ammiel Alcalay, The Village Voice The New Republic
Review
"This first English translation of Feraoun's deeply personal and poignant record of the Algerian war of independence is long overdue. The reader will be struck by the historical and anthropological precision that characterizes Mouloud Feraouns record of the war."—Nicole Kaplan, North African Studies Martin Thomas - The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History
Review
“An illuminating study of French intellectual responses to the war.”—New York Review of Books New York Review of Books
Review
"The Journal has long been known to students of the Algerian War: its appearance in English will make it available to a broader audience, and will be especially welcome to students of postcolonial theory whose themes it admirably exemplifies."—Irwin Wall, Research in African Literatures Phillip Naylor - The Journal of Military History
Review
This translation of the original French version published in 1962 is thus long overdue. Perhaps its greatest value it as an unmatched description of the infinite dilemmas faced by Algerias ‘Europeanized Muslims. The journal provides a constant reminder of the inevitable accommodations made by Muslims caught between two bloody extremes. In its focus on the personal consequences of killings and counter-killings within the Algerian Muslim community, it gives real voice to those whom Fanon characterized as Damnès de la terre."—Martin Thomas, The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History Ammiel Alcalay - The Village Voice
Review
“Le Sueurs great achievement is to reveal the complexity of the political and moral choices faced by intellectuals and, by extension, by the wider populations of Algeria and France.”—Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History
Review
“Le Sueur has provided an insightful and lively interpretation of an ongoing moral, sociological, political, and intellectual struggle taking place on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea.”—American Historical Review American Historical Review
Review
"Feraoun is best known for a chronicle of events, titled simply Journal, that he kept during the eight-year war that led to Algerian independence in 1962. . . . His Journal makes clear Feraouns lucidity regarding the national question-an issue that has bedeviled our times and of which Algerian history has been in many ways prototypical."—Roger Kaplan, The New Republic Roger Kaplan
About the Author
James D. Le Sueur is an associate professor of history at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He is the editor of Mouloud Feraoun's Journal, 1955-1962: Reflections on the French-Algerian War (available in a Bison Books edition) and The Decolonization Reader and The Decolonization Sourcebook. He contributed new material to Ben Abros Assassination! July 14 and Henri Allegs The Question, both available in Bison Books editions.