Abdellatif Laabi: The Bottom of the Jar at The Mosaic Rooms

The author will be joined by the translator André Naffis-Sahely for readings and discussion from his novel and from his newly published chapbook of poems, produced by the Poetry Translation Centre. The Bottom of the Jar is an exploration of Laabi’s childhood city in Fez, Morocco, undertaken through Namoussa, his semi-fictional kindred spirit. The novel is not only a personal testament of Laâbi’s early years, but a work of great social and political import; one that reflects on and evokes the charged atmosphere during the final days of French colonial occupation of the North African country and the painful road to independence.