For Amin Maalouf, we live in an era that is disturbing, sometimes terrifying, and at the same time more wonderful than anything humanity has known since the dawn of time. The Francoliban writer opened on Saturday the 39th edition of the Guadalajara International Book Fair (FIL) with an optimistic speech amid uncertainty. In a world where racist, xenophobic, and nationalistic tendencies are on the rise, Maalouf, upon receiving the Prize for Literature in Romance Languages, recalled that the prize specifically celebrates “literature, the diversity of languages, and, in some way, the kinship between all human cultures.”
author African Leon the Wrecks of civilizationsI remembered when I still had a child who was accompanied by a journalist priest to the press and editorial offices. “Ahí nació is the great passion of my life: observing the course of the world.” A great passion that deserves recognition with great awards such as the Primo Goncourt or El Pricea de Asturias and which he emphasized “has never waned, on the contrary, there has been a more intense journey over the years”. At the same time, Maalouf acknowledged, “I never imagined that war would return with such force to the center of today; on the ground in my native region, the Levant, but also in my new home, Europe.”
An exile like your character African Leon – A Granadian Muslim who abandoned his land after the invasion of the Catholic Kings, traveled through Morocco and Egypt and ended up at the papal court in Rome – Maalouf, a vagabond from the Mediterranean. He is Arab, but he writes some books in French that constitute a permanent invitation to cultural mixing. The ideal is also embodied by this year’s honorary guest, Barcelona, “an open and multicultural city,” as described by exhibition director Marisol Schulz.
For his part, Barcelona Mayor Jaume Colboni stated that 80% of Spanish literary production is issued in Barcelona, the city that “thinks, writes, reads, and loves in Catalonia and in Castellano.” The city’s mayor noted that the city’s strong book industry comes to the festival every year, but in this edition it “comes with everything.”
Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard also participated in the inauguration ceremony, showing the best harmony with the Morenita government behind something in the past few years. Ebrard spoke of the “global” nature of the festival, and described his admiration for Maalouf because he embodies “the value of intercultural awareness.” The Minister of Economy said that he was an author who distinguished his generation, and was mentioned throughout the historical article The Crusades witnessed by the Arabs.
One of the greatest characteristics of our time, according to Maalouf, is that everything that “belongs to the scope of science and technology is advancing unceasingly and with increasing speed,” while “what belongs to our moral development of humanity is deviating or even regressing.” In recent years, scientific and technological development has witnessed unprecedented acceleration, mainly due to artificial intelligence.
Profound transformations that occur increasingly and more quickly—years, months—and seem to have no limits. Al-Maalouf said: “It is clear that our mentalities and thinking patterns are completely unable to follow this rhythm.”
Maalouf tries to “maintain a positive outlook,” but without “losing his clarity.” The threats, for example, to the arms profession of technological advancement require that “humanity rise above its own laws, its selfishness, and its harm.” The author detects “a decline in democracy, a decline in the state of right” across the planet.
Despite this troubling diagnosis, Maalouf says he is “not despairing or giving up.” It is not considered nostalgia because “we will never return to the world before it. We can regret it or celebrate it, but in any case we must be aware of it in order to move forward.” The solution, point, is not to oppose technological progress, nor to reject it, deny it, or close your eyes to it. The solution “is to seize this progress and put it in the service of man, his dignity and freedom, and to transform it into a tool of liberation and not a tool of bargaining.”
As part of this proposal, the writer fulfilled the role he must play in twenty-first century literature: his first task is to “make us aware of the complexity of the world in which we live.” The second task is to “convince us that despite our differences, our enemies, and the resentments that divide us, our destiny is shared.” Because as Maalouf said: “We live together, and we disappear together.”