Youssef Fadel

Youssef Fadel (born 1949) is a Moroccan novelist and playwright.

Early life He was born in Casablanca.

He participated in leftist cultural and political circles starting in the 1960s and was imprisoned by the Moroccan government in the 1980s in the infamous Moulay al-Sheriff prison, during the notorious Years of Lead. He continues to invest political significance in his work today, stating in 2018 that "o be a writer you have to be against the state, firstly...Against everything—the writer is a demolisher. He or she must demolish all taboos, all statues, all idols."

Jorge Aguadé published a study of the diglossic language used in Fadel's works in "Des romans diglossiques: le cas de Youssef Fadel" (Cadiz University, Cadiz, Spain).