Frantz Fanon, born in Martinique in 1925, is considered one of the most analytically incisive anti-colonial thinkers and activists. The physician and psychiatrist fought as a member of the Algerian Liberation Front FLN for independence from the colonial power France, wrote with “The Damned of this Earth” and “Black Skin, White Masks” two works about the psychological consequences of colonial rule and colonial terror that are still widely read today.
This portrait of his companion Alice Cherki, a psychotherapist and psychiatrist from Algiers, paints a contoured picture of Frantz Fannon-dense and fact-filled writing, light on its feet and narrative like an essay.
The publisher writes about the book:
“Frantz Fanon’s biography illuminates the violence of then and now, and his reflections on racism and madness are prophecy and signpost. Alice Cherki knew Fanon well. She worked alongside him as a psychiatrist in Algeria and Tunisia and, like him, was involved in the liberation movement during the Algerian War. It demonstrates that Fanon explored the individual and social effects of racial oppression as well as the possibilities of overcoming alienation. Fanon’s predictions and warnings for the postcolonial period have been shockingly confirmed, and not only in Algeria.
Fanon, who died of leukemia at 36, became a symbolic figure for the Third World.”
Alice Cherki 2002 [Orig. 2001]: Frantz Fannon. A portrait. Hamburg: Nautilus
If you don’t have a bookstore worth supporting near you, you can also buy the book from the alternative non-profit online bookstore links-lesen.de, which supports political projects with the profits. The link to the book is here.