Fiction April 1, 2013

Abdellah Taïa writes short sentences, often without verbs. Single words sometimes. There is light and space in his prose. And despair. At times, he uses the ellipsis suggestively . . . bringing out the apertures within and between words and thoughts, eliciting the unbridgeable gap between individuals. That is where desire seems to lie, and where longing—and melancholia—is to be found in his writing.