wo Nobel laureates in literature, Nigeria’s Wole Soyinka and France’s Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio, opened on October 16 in Rabat the first gatherings of the “House of the Worlds of the Book.”
The Academy of the Kingdom of Morocco conceived the initiative after UNESCO named Rabat World Book Capital for 2026. Its permanent secretary, Abdeljalil Lahjomri, presented its first project: an African library built on 54 books, one for each country on the continent.
Two spaces fitted out in the capital will also host literary residencies and debates.
The first African to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, Wole Soyinka hailed a day on which literary Africa had met in Rabat. Le Clezio defended the book as a bulwark against forgetting and a path toward others.
The House will soon open its doors, and the Academy means to make the title UNESCO entrusted to Rabat last well beyond 2026.
Photo: The Silk Road Today.
