Such an announcement deserved three “i’s” and capital letters: “SURPRISE: NEW SERIES! »wrote Riad Sattouf, on 1Ahem September, on his Instagram account. Thus he informed his approximately 315,000 subscribers, and the world, of the arrival, on October 8, of the first volume of I, Fadi, the stolen brother.continuation or rather counterpoint to The Arab of the futurethis enormously successful autobiographical comic saga (Allary, 2014-2022). The fourth of the six volumes had revealed the secret that was at the heart of it: while the author’s mother, French, and her three children lived in France, the father, Syrian, had kidnapped Fadi, the youngest of the children. , and he had taken it. to Ter Maaleh, his town, near Homs. Fadi’s mother and siblings were unable to see him again twenty years later, in 2011, after bringing him to France at the start of the Syrian civil war. The final part ended with this reunion.
Long interviews between Riad and Fadi Sattouf followed, providing the material for I, Fadi, the stolen brother.where the youngest tells his version, the separation from his mother, the discovery of Syria, learning Arabic. I, Fadi… is, after The young actorvolume 1 (2021), second work published by Livres du futur, a house created by the author. And an opportunity to return with him to his work, rewarded in 2023 with the Grand Prix of the Angoulême Festival.
Yo
At the Pompidou Center, the exhibition “The comic, 1964-2024” (until November 4) hosts plates of The Arab of the future in the “self-writing” section. This shows whether Riad Sattouf will have marked the way of telling stories. But he also shines in what we could call, following Pierre Pachet (1937-2016), autobiographies of others. After telling it in the first person, in Esther’s notebooksthe stories of a young woman between 10 and 18 years old (Allary, 2016-2024) and, in The young actorthose of Vincent Lacoste, mixed here with the voice and thoughts of his brother. “In what Esther and Fadi told meexplains to “World of Books”, There are things very different from what you would see in your place, or what you would think. I don’t see how I could tell this in the third person. Esther is much more positive than me on many issues. Fadi offered me a different view of life in Syria than I had as a child. My comment about what he experienced was not very interesting and it seemed more relevant to write it in “I”. » Don’t experiment “misplaced guilt” Regarding your neighbor, you feel free to tell these stories as you see fit.
You have 71.71% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
