Of Iranian origin, Cécile Ladjali is an associate of modern letters. She lives in Paris where she teaches literature and playwriting at La Salle Blanche (“laboratory of the actor-researcher”). She is director of the Baudelaire Program at the Robert de Sorbon Foundation and hosts literary meetings at the Théâtre La Reine Blanche and the Maison de la Poésie. Most of his work has been published by Actes Sud, including recently “Benedict” (2018) and “La Fille de personne” (2020).
“In the psychiatric hospital of which he directs a department in Tel Aviv, Tom strives to establish a real dialogue with Steiner, a whimsical old musician, and with Roshan, a pregnant Palestinian, interned for a denial of pregnancy. Passionate about the he enigma of what babies hear and feel in utero, Tom is haunted by the memory of the confused or feverish voices that shortly preceded his birth in a double drama: his mother was at the bedside of her twin, a freediver immersed in the coma, while televisions around the world followed the descent of a space capsule with which all sound contact seemed lost… Like echoes from the amniotic past and mingling with the torments of the present, the characters’ streams of consciousness say and repeat the confinement, the impossible communication, and yet the hope of joining others in a shared understanding.
Against the background of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a sensitive profession of faith towards the words that we give and above all that we know how to receive. (Presentation of Editions Actes Sud)
Bonus snippet: Cécile Ladjali talks about Iran today and the ties she has with her country of origin.
Cécile Ladjali and Iran