This Saturday, France commemorates the 60th anniversary of the Evian Accords and the ceasefire in Algeria and also in Angoulême, where the 49th International Comics Festival is being held. The Algerian war can be found in several albums, including one in a comic mode with “Un général, des générals” published by Lombard, and another more realistic with “Called from Algeria” published by Marabulles.
With our special correspondent in Angoulême, Sophie Torlotin
In June 1958, the General de Gaulle is recalled to power and goes to Algiers and pronounces his famous ” I understood you “. The French in Algeria are reassured. Like the generals who maneuvered to bring de Gaulle back to power, they believe that the colony will remain in the French fold.
François Boucq and Nicolas Juncker tell this misunderstanding and this tragicomic story in the form of a joke in the album A general, generals : It’s not strictly speaking a farce because the story is still very tragic, specifies Nicolas Juncker, the screenwriter. “ We have the war in Algeria, we have a change of republic, we have a risk of civil war. Paradoxically, we realize that people are overwhelmed, whether it’s the military or the politicians in Paris. There is no strategy and at no time do they arise. That’s why there is this vaudeville side, because everything goes very fast, there are doors slamming, it’s a play. »
The war seen from the side of young soldiers
The Algerian war finds itself treated in a more realistic mode, closer to the field, at the height of young soldiers performing their military service in Called from Algeria : “ The worst thing is not so much to have tortured, because in the end it was the officers who tortured, but it is to have witnessed it because they are not torturers, they are not psychopaths, says designer Deloupy. And when they came back, they had to live with what they had let happen. »
And the designer Deloupy is thinking of a new volume that would tell the Algerian war, but this time seen from the Algerian side.
►To listen: Angoulême, the Manga City