Search results for ""Author Angela M. Brewer""

Bored housewives, kept in seclusion, smuggling in Harlequin romances. Modish young men transformed into Islamic militants. A baker unwittingly caught in a web of intrigue, an imam whose faith is tested by urban corruption, a lonely divorcee accused of prostitution—all take part in Merzak Allouache's novel of a society on the brink of crisis.Allouache tells the story of the people of Bab el-Oued, a poor neighborhood in contemporary Algiers. His experience as a filmmaker lends the work a cinematic quality, bringing it vibrantly and immediately to life. Bab el-Oued's memorable characters draw us into their world. Entering their lives, we come to appreciate the human costs of economic and political decline, and also to understand something of the reasons underlying the power of new and violent forms of Islamic militancy."I wrote this book," said Algerian director Merzak Allouache, "to exorcise the many frustrations that arose when making the film Bab el-Oued City in Algiers. Writing the book gave me a sense of freedom not possible with the constraints of the camera, especially when shooting in a hostile environment, as was the case there." Bab el-Oued City, released to wide acclaim in 1993, is Allouache's fifth full-length film. He now lives in France.

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The author began her working career as a freelance conference steno-typist, and it was in this capacity that she was Jacques Lacan's steno-typist ("keybasher") from 1967 to 1979. Awarding him a "gold medal for boorishness" - Lacan did not speak a word to her in those twelve years - it was only after she became a psychoanalyst herself that Pierrakos felt adequately equipped to explore and write about, this experience in depth. Her careful but excoriating criticism of the Lacanian system will be of interest to all readers wishing to understand more about one of the most curious phenomena of our time - how a large part of the French intelligentsia came to be captivated by "the pathetic spectacle of an old man tossing bits of string representing Borromean knots to his audience, and of hands stretching out to receive them like children at the circus". The author records: "the posturing was backed up by a quasi-military organization, interlinking regions by sending analysts into virgin territory to preach the good word. Some had undergone only summary analysis and training, since, to quote Lacan "the analyst is only answerable to himself".

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