Adapted from the podcast, an interview entirely rewritten and enriched with unpublished passages.
Born of an Algerian father and a French mother, Alice Zeniter’s early vocation for reading and writing is almost a myth. In counterpoint, her travels in Algeria—which nourish the writing of L’Art de perdre—, the importance of a room of one’s own, or the “semolina strategy” which avoids the author going to the mini-market, remind us of the material reality of the writer. Not to mention rule number one: learn how to finish a text.
