Remembering 17 October 1961 and the Novels of Rachid Boudjedra

The infamous but ostensibly forgotten massacre of Algerians in Paris was not suddenly rediscovered in the late 1990s, but in fact had remained in the collective memory of North African immigrants. Two novels by Rachid Boudjedra, Topographie idéale pour une agression caractérisée (1975) and Le vainqueur de coupe (1981), attest to the persistence of these memories. Both memory and an appreciation of history are necessary to move successfully in the city. These novels suggest how the urban immigrant community may produce and use history, as Boudjedra's characters become creators of lieux de mémoire. The development of immigrant lieux de mémoire nonetheless differs from that of "native" French places described by the historian Pierre Nora. Today, France is attempting simultaneously to manage memories of its recent history and to include immigrants and their descendants in the very society that is only now recollecting parts of their history. Discovering what might constitute lieux de mémoire for immigrants and their descendants is therefore vital to understanding the contemporary multiethnic French society.