Kamel Daoud

Kamel Daoud (; born June 17, 1970) is an Algerian writer and journalist. He is best known for his 2013 novel Meursault, contre-enquête (The Meursault Investigation) and his 2024 novel Houris.

Early life and education Kamel Daoud was born in Mostaganem, Algeria, on June 17, 1970, the oldest of six children in an Arabic-speaking Muslim family. His father was a police officer titled "Raina raikoum" ("Our opinion, your opinion"). In 2011 he was editor of the paper and still writing the column.

he was a columnist in various media, an editorialist in the online newspaper Algérie-Focus and his articles were also published in Slate Afrique. After the success of his novel Meursault, contre-enquête in France in 2014, he started writing opinion pieces on a range of issues for the conservative French weekly magazine Le Point.

Fiction Daoud began writing short fiction, becoming famous in Algeria in the 2000s. as well as the Prix François Mauriac (Aquitaine) and the Prix des cinq continents de la francophonie. It was also shortlisted for the Prix Renaudot. In April 2015, an excerpt from The Meursault Investigation was featured in the New Yorker magazine. The novel was a retelling, or "counterinvestigation" of Albert Camus's L'Etranger. with the judges praising the author for giving "voice to the suffering associated with a dark period in Algeria's history, particularly that of women".

The novel has received a mixed reception in Algeria, but even critics agree that the Algerian media campaign against Daoud has been relentless. In 2011 he was briefly arrested for participating in a demonstration. Three days later, Abdelfattah Hamadache Zeraoui, a Salafist imam at the time working on Echorouk News, declared that Daoud should be put to death for his statements Daoud filed a complaint in Algerian court and the judiciary delivered a judgment on March 8, 2016 that Daoud's attorney called "unprecedented": Zeraoui was sentenced to three to six months in prison and a 50,000-dinar fine. However, the judgment was set aside in June 2016 by the Oran Court of Appeal on the basis of a jurisdiction challenge.

The November 20, 2015, issue of the New York Times featured an op-ed by Daoud titled "Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It" in both English and French, that was highly critical of Saudi Arabia. The February 14, 2016, issue of the New York Times featured a controversial Both of these articles were republished in his 2017 collection of essays Mes Indépendances.

After legal action was launched against him in Algeria and France by the alleged subject of his latest novel, Algeria issued two international arrest warrants for Daoud.

Awards and honours 2014: Prix François Mauriac (Aquitaine), for Meursault, contre-enquête 2024: Prix Goncourt for Houris Houris (2024)

Novellas and short stories La Fable du nain (Dar El Gharb, 2003) "Musa" (2015), an excerpt from The Meursault Investigation.

Non-fiction Chroniques Mac-Arabe: Raïna Raïkoum (2005), a collection of essays Chroniques: Selected Columns, 2010-2016, trans. Elisabeth Zerofsky (Other Press, 2018). Le Peintre dévorant la femme (Stock, 2018).

Footnotes