Gamal Ghitany was born in Egypt in 1945. Self-taught, he is now considered to be the rightful heir of Naguib Mahfouz. He has written numerous short stories and novels, namelyLivre des Illuminations (Seuil, 2005). His latest book, the fifth volume of Poussières de l’effacement, is a work of memory which aims to vanquish the painful disappearance of time by rescuing memories from obscurity. In bringing moments from the past to life – all these flecks of dust which resist being forgotten – he provides a deep and emotional kaleidoscope of Egypt, its inhabitants, its districts and its oriental sensuality.

Manuel Rivas is a poet, novelist and short story writer. He was born in La Coruña in 1957. His writing, anchored in the soil of Galicia, analyses questions of emigration and the damage caused by Francoism and the Spanish Civil War. His latest novel, L'Éclat dans l’abîme, tells the tale of the book-burning carried out by the Phalangists in 1936 in the port of La Coruña. With passion and lyricism, Manuel Rivas rewrites the memory of his people resisting the fury of Francoism in this magnificent palimpsest made up of a thousand and one tales.

Born in Djibouti in 1965, Abdourahman A. Waberi is an African writer writing in French. A great admirer of the Somali novelist, Nuruddin Farah, he is the author of seven works of fiction for which he has been awarded a number of literary awards. Africa lies at the heart of all his novels which examine themes such as exile, decolonisation, war and famine. Memory also has an important role to play in his work. He has dedicated a trilogy to Djibouti and a novel to the Rwandan genocide.

Lídia Jorge was born in Boliqueim in the Algarve in 1946. She is one of the most important voices of contemporary Portuguese and European literature. Her novels often reflect Portuguese reality through a brilliant psychological analysis of her characters. InNous combattrons l’ombre, the author places us inside the troubled head of a psychoanalyst who is a victim of his anxieties, weaknesses and obsessions. The writing is intimate and captivating. On the release of the book, Jorge was awarded the Grand Prize of the Portuguese Authors’ Society.

Aharon Appelfeld is an Israeli writer who was born in 1932 in Czernowitz in Bucovinia. His writing mostly revolves around the life of Jews in Europe before and during the Second World War. Himself a survivor of the Holocaust, he considers that he incarnates the memory of the Jewish people. To reject this inheritance would be the equivalent of rejecting oneself, a kind of a suicide. It is through literature that the author tries to perpetuate it. Aharon Appelfeld has managed to mark himself out as one of the greatest Jewish writers of our time, thanks to his powerful, rigorous and realist writing.