2084
Inscribed and signed: “à Jean-Claude Mocellin, bien amicalement, Boualem Sansal, 19-9-2016.”
The band “Grand prix du roman de l’Académie française – meilleur livre Lire de l’année 2015” has been added.
Abistan: an immense empire, taking its name from the prophet Abi, Yölah’s “delegate” on earth. Its system rests on amnesia and submission to the one god, where all personal thought is banned and erased by an omnipresent surveillance apparatus able to detect deviant ideas and acts: a century after 1984, an Orwellian projection in which Winston’s incredulous disgust finds, in 2084, its counterpart in the figure of Ati, unable to remain within the limits assigned to him. Yet there is no cause for alarm: as Boualem Sansal writes in his opening warning, “Sleep soundly, good people, everything here is entirely false and the rest is under control.”
Current events have since cruelly proven him wrong. One hopes literature will soon reclaim its rightful place.
A very fine copy of the rare first printing.