Rozzi Djiddi: “Honest and free writing will eventually reach others”

The novel in Chad was written in French—the language imposed by the coloniser—until the third millennium, when a generation emerged known as the Arabophones, in contrast to the Francophones. They wrote literary works in Arabic, which they had learned in Arabic schools and at King Faisal University in N’djamena, the country’s capital, which encourages its students to engage in creative writing. Through these African writers, the Arabic language gained new ground, with stories set in the continent, allowing it to absorb the region’s rich heritage of legends and folk wisdom. 

Geeska speaks to Rozzi Djiddi, a novelist who has contributed to the Arabic literary canon with works that introduce new worlds unfamiliar to most Arabic language readers. Djiddi has published several works, including A Boat Chasing Its Anchor, The Age of Boredom, and Echoes of Memory. In 2024, he won the State Prize for Literary Excellence and received the Tlemcen House Grant for his novel The Secretly Public History of Adam and Eve. His novel Echoes of Memory was longlisted for the 2025 Khatla Prize. 

Mu’tasim Al-Sha’er: Africa is rich in legends and folktales. How has folk storytelling influenced your literary output? And what were the early foundations of your literary development?   

Rozzi Djiddi: Writers often recall a grandmother who used to tell them stories. I envy them for that. There is definitely an influence of folk heritage on my work—after all, a writer writes what they have lived and the stories they have heard, because writing, in the end, is a form of confession. As for my early readings, I don't remember much, except for the first book I read that truly astonished me and made me want to tell stories and become a writer. It wasn’t a literary book in the conventional sense, but I consider it one of the finest works ever written in Arabic literature: The Sealed Nectar, a biography of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). I found it in my uncle’s library—he was my guardian, and I grew up in his house. From there, I moved on to One Thousand and One Nights, then The Days by Taha Hussein, which led me to Naguib Mahfouz and Yusuf Idris, particularly his story A House Made of Flesh. That’s how I became a reader first, then a writer.  

MA: You are undoubtedly an avid reader, and this habit has seeped into the characters of your novel The Age of Boredom. The narrator says: “We kept staring at books instead of staring at the ugly face of the world.” In fact, you dedicated the final chapter to the power of reading, with the narrator declaring: “I have been writing letters since primary school, a hunter of words. I will die without achieving my dream, but I am happy with what I have read and known. Reading still gives me pleasure and solace, even in my final days.” What is your philosophy of reading, and how can we bring humanity back to the pages of books in an age where mobile screens have stolen our attention? 

RD: I am, first and foremost, a reader. As Borges said: “One writes what they can, but they read what they love.” Reading is both enjoyable and beneficial. Writing, though it offers some pleasure, is not as rewarding as reading. I enjoy reading—I love it. Sometimes, I wonder where non-readers find their joy. I believe that we, as readers, have discovered a pleasure that others have not, but it is an experience that everyone deserves to have. 

During my years of unemployment, I spent most of my time inside al-Muna Library. There, I read and read. We spent our days in that library, and in the evenings, we would gather at a café to discuss what we had read. We often read a book a day, sometimes more. Imagine three friends in a dusty library in a small town, reading literature and philosophy until their stomachs cried out in hunger. At noon, they would step out to buy a small sandwich, then return to their worn-out couches to continue reading until the librarian announced it was five o’clock and time to close. We read because we enjoyed it, because the library shielded us from society’s judgmental gaze, and because, within those walls, we felt significant—felt like we were doing something not everyone could do: sitting and reading a book. 

Today, reading rates have dropped, even among avid readers, due to mobile phones and social media. That’s why we must foster a culture of reading from an early age. We need to make children read—that’s how we can save future generations.  

MA: In The Age of Boredom, the narrator says: “Misery has shattered everyone’s soul. Evil is everywhere.” We are witnessing crises and turmoil daily—in Africa, the Middle East, and across the world. Our fears for the future have grown into monstrous shadows. What message does Rozzi Djddi hope to convey through his fiction? 

RD: In The Age of Boredom, I tried to depict what we lived through between 2015 and 2020—years that were difficult for our generation and for the country as a whole. When we graduated from university, the government announced a hiring freeze in the public sector. The country entered a phase of austerity due to an economic collapse and plummeting oil prices. This crisis forced companies and organisations to leave, and the government could no longer absorb new graduates, leaving us in a state of absolute despair. 

We spent our evenings in the cafés of N’Djamena, sharing cups of coffee with the flies—sometimes on a friend’s tab, sometimes on credit. Everything I wrote in The Age of Boredom reflects the struggles of unemployed youth facing societal scorn, personal wounds inflicted by shattered dreams, existential despair, and questions about the meaning of life and our worth to ourselves and our families. 

People don’t realise the psychological damage unemployment causes. The suffering of an unemployed person with their own thoughts is far more painful than anything society can say or do. The Age of Boredom tells the stories of N’Djamena’s jobless youth, living without hope. 

MA: Last year, you earned a master’s degree in law and are now studying at the Judicial Training Institute. How do you balance journalism, the judiciary, fiction writing, and managing Maso Publishing House? 

RD: Once I am appointed as a judge, I will have to leave journalism due to legal restrictions. The judiciary is a power, and so is the press—it is not permissible to combine them in Chad. However, writing is my way of speaking, so I will never stop. Publishing is an intellectual endeavour, and the judiciary allows engagement in literary and intellectual fields. I believe I can be a judge by day and a writer by night. I wouldn’t be the first—Tawfiq al-Hakim worked in the judiciary, and the novelist Ashraf al-Ashmawi is also a judge. 

MA: Few Arabs know that Arabic fiction is being written in Chad instead of French. This also applies to writers in Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea (except for Haji Jaber), and Djibouti. Arabic flourished before colonial rule—do you see the return to Arabic culture as a form of African liberation from European colonialism, especially in light of growing protests against French influence in so-called Francophone Africa?  

RD: I don’t see it as a form of liberation. We have other languages besides the two official ones, and we use them daily. But at least Arabic didn’t enter our country by force. I don’t believe French cultural influence will wane—our administration is French, the state is Francophone, and there is no support for Arabic-speaking intellectuals to compete with state-backed French initiatives. However, I do believe the time has come for everyone to feel free in their choices. 

MA: In Echoes of Memory, you discuss how French colonialism reshaped Chad’s culture by massacring hundreds of scholars in the Wadai Sultanate—scholars who taught Islamic jurisprudence, Arabic, and Quranic sciences. How did the Kabkabk Massacre impact Chadian culture today?   

RD: The Kabkabk Massacre was one of the main reasons for the decline of the Arabic language. After that massacre, in which Chad’s most knowledgeable scholars were killed, many scholars and students fled to Sudan, particularly to Darfur. This allowed the French to establish their own schools and operate without competition.  

MA: Most African countries still suffer from indirect colonialism or from the effects of the colonial era. There are movements that resist the colonial legacy and seek to highlight African identity and its civilisational role, such as Pan-Africanism. In your opinion, what is the cultural role in achieving African liberation and comprehensive renaissance? 

RD: I believe that literature plays an important role in shaping the identity of a group of people living in a specific region. Having a shared heritage and unified mythologies are common factors that contribute to building unity and identity. These are the foundations that Africa needs in order to build its own narrative, free from colonial and orientalist ideas and from the superiority complex with which the “other” views the unfamiliar. Here, I mean the colonialist’s view towards this continent, its heritage, and culture. 

MA: In the book The African Writer's Dilemma by Charles R. Larson, there are many challenges that hinder African literature from reaching the Western reader. Do you think writing in the West’s language and mindset is the only way to reach them? And are there any Chadian writers who write in French and have achieved global success in this regard? 

RD: Today, it is very difficult to reach the Western reader unless you write in English. But we do not write literature to reach the Western reader. Personally, I write about what matters to my country and its neighbours. Literature is, by nature, subjective—and only afterward does it become universal. The only way for the literature we write here in Africa to be recognised is for us to write freely, and to write well and truthfully. Honest and free writing will eventually reach others, even through translation. 

MA: The internet revolution has made the idea of reaching global audiences seem more attainable, especially for young people. Do you dream of global recognition, or do you see the term “globalism” as a colonial one because it positions the West at the centre of the world, as if no one else exists? 

RD: Western civilisation is the one that reaped the fruits of the last centuries of human effort, which is why it appears as if it represents globalism — and that’s its right, and its good fortune, to have benefited from the major renaissance that happened there. But the term “globalism” should not be limited to what the West defines. Is it a colonial term? Yes, of course. But that’s for other reasons, used by the West for specific interests — including extending dominance and making us firmly believe in it. 

MA: Do you think that you, as African writers who write in Arabic, need a platform that brings you together and attracts the attention of Arab readers and cultural institutions?  

RD: Yes, we need platforms, clubs, and prizes. We need platforms that bring together African writers in general, to strengthen our cultural commonalities. Sadly, we know a lot about the far corners of the world, yet we know very little about our African neighbours. But the matter is very difficult. We belong to countries colonised by various powers. Today, we speak dozens of languages in Africa, and we can barely understand one another. 

MA: Do you think the fact that many Africans — like Chinua Achebe, Abdulrazak Gurnah, and others — have won the Nobel Prize sheds more light on African literature? And what other ways are there to highlight our literature, besides waiting for a Nobel win? 

RD: It is true that when a writer wins awards, it shines a light on their work. There are readers who wait for prize lists to choose what to read. The success of African writers in winning the Nobel, the Man Booker, the Goncourt, or other prizes benefits readers, exposing them to different worlds and various issues. 

I believe that we, as Africans, should establish awards specific to the continent, in different languages — or at least in a few of the most widely spoken languages — and then engage in the process of translation. We Africans speak most of the world’s languages, so why not invest in translation to introduce the world to what is being written here? So that people stop learning about a small village in Central Africa from an old Frenchman. 

MA: You and others have turned to writing in Arabic, and you surely faced difficulties along the way. In your novel The Age of Boredom, there is something that hints at this struggle: “A year ago, I sent a novel to an Arab publishing house. They kept the manuscript for a long time, then told me: we cannot publish your work for commercial reasons. They noticed I was an unknown writer from an African country that speaks French alongside Arabic and is not considered an Arab country, and that Arabic readers there are a minority,” says the protagonist of your novel. Tell us about the struggle of Chadian Arabophone writers to reach the Arab audience in their country and the wider Arab world.

RD: Publishing is difficult, especially at the beginning, and when the writer is far from the centre. We write in Arabic in a country where most educated people read in French. We are a minority in our country and on the margins of the Arab world. Everything is difficult for us. We have to write much better than any Arab writer publishing in a central country in order for our work to be accepted. Then, we have to convince the publisher of the importance of what we write, even though we are offering different worlds, unlike the worlds the Arab reader is accustomed to. What we are doing is extremely difficult. 

MA: What are the most common themes addressed in contemporary Chadian literature? 

RD: I believe we have spoken a lot about war, because of the civil wars. We have also addressed the political crises that caused deep fractures in our society. And we have written extensively about rural-to-urban migration.