The Chrysalis is a novel by Algerian novelist Aïcha
Lemsine. The English version was translated from the French La Chrysalide by Dorothy S. Blair who has done a
splendid job, at no point did I sense this was a translation apart from the use
of "old chum" that I cannot imagine any North African using in
English to convey something like mon cher.
It was published in 1976 in French by Editions des femmes and picked up by
Quartet books who published it in English in 1993.
In the English version, the book opens with an Introdution penned
by the author dated 1993, at a time when the situation had seriously
deteriorated in Algeria. In this intro, Lemsine has an amusing little
rant: "Exposing the archaic condition of women at the time of Socialism in
Algeria was not without risk... In fact, while readers and critics in Tunisia,
Morocco and Europe were almost unanimous in their enthusiastic welcome of the
Chrysalis, in Algeria the book was banned and subjected to the destructive
condemnation of certain so-called left-wing intellectuals, in the service of the regime."
[my emphasis] At this point, I should tell you that Aisha Lemsine is
the spouse
of an Algerian diplomat. But this point raised by the author got me
thinking further on the fiction's relationship with facts. What was
Lemsine's intention before grabbing her pen? Was it to weave a fiction
(inspired by facts as any fiction is) to express her own views through
her craft about a situation she found both outrageous and inspiring.
Or was it to use fiction as a very light cloak to denounce a factual
situation. If the latter weighed more, then this book would not be
fiction but a historical analysis. I am certain though, that it is
fiction I read.
In this intro, Lemsine explains her title choice. Why the Chrysalis? It is not at all obvious in the
story. She explains that the symbolim "is to be found in the
struggle for life attached to the chrysalis's efforts to emerge from the
darkness of its cocoon.... the essential thing is this sublime impetus towards
freedom and light." The Chrysalis being the Algerian woman.
The novel recounts the story of a family over three generations.
It is a small book though, a mere 175 pages to tell the life of an entire
family before, during and post-war in Algeria up to the mid-70s. But the
aim seems to lay elsewhere, that of telling the evolving social condition of
the Algerian woman, and her rights or lack thereof, during these three
cornerstone eras.
I
liked Lemsine's style (in translation at least), I must check her out
in French. She weaves a story with a fluid, easy language; the rhythm is natural and
engaging throughout. The first third of the story was very compelling.
The story begins with the description of a woman's scream lasting
two pages. A wretched scream, from the depths of sorrow, a scream of anger, of
despair, of rebellion. Of revolution. As it starts echoing throw the
lines, we discover that it belongs to Khadidja who is turning towards the past
jsut as we are turning the page opening the family saga: "A whole past
emerged from the depths of time, recalling a story, similar to thousands of
others that form the landmarks for society, and what traditions, deformed by
men, had made of these stories."
So far so brilliant. The story of Khadidja unfolds. She is
married at 16 to a man she had never seen, comes to live in a far away village
in her husband's family home with her mother-in-law, and three
sisters-in-law. Luckily Mokrane her spouse is deeply in love with her and
she him but Khadidja will come to face a village-woman's lot: polygamy,
sterility, oppressive traditions which relegate a woman's say to naught.
You get the picture.
Past
the first third of the book, the dimension of the characters became caricatual. There are also too many
characters for less than 200 pages and when the focus' changes from
Khadikja to her husband's daughter, the rhythm feels broken. A great
deal of calamities
strike Khadidja and Si Mokrane's family, following each other too
closely and
the story became stretched. It is only then that I realised what I actually had in my hands: a romance novel.
Aïcha Lemsine aka Aïcha Laidi is an Algerian novelist born in
1942. She writes in French.
She published two other books after The Chrysalis: one in
1978, Porphyry Skies (Ciel de porphyre) and in 1983, The Voices's Trial by Ordeal (Ordalie des voix). She has been translated in English
and Arabic (also in Spanish I am told).
