Sattouf's childhood is the stage on which the events of the novel play out. From the nascent regime of Gaddafi to the more insidious, but no less dangerous regime of Assad, Sattouf uses an acerbic humour to explore life in three dictatorships, two political and the third under his increasingly despotic father; whilst the former two are far more dangerous and have a far bigger impact on the wider world, the latter defines the small world which defines Sattouf's childhood.

With Clémentine transcribing his words and "rendering them intelligible," Abdul-Razak obtains a Ph.D. in history from the Sorbonne. In 1980, he moves the family to Libya after accepting a job as an associate professor. (He is paid in US dollars, with the funds sent to an account in the Channel Islands.) The flood of rich, detailed, authentic, often completely unexpected observations is both disturbing and mesmerizing, thanks in part to the clever narrative strategy of presenting them from a vague through-the-eyes-of-a-child-yet-filtered-through-adult-awareness perspective that does not appear to have any agenda whatsoever: it appears to do little more than taking in all kinds of weirdness with wide-open eyes, though ultimately, of course, it does provide a critique of both Arab-Muslim and Western attitudes and lifestyles. The thing is: the results don't feel pedantic or manipulative in the slightest, and this is crucial to the appeal of the story. Just following the father around is an experience unlike any I’ve ever had: I mean, I never know what this guy is going to do or say next, because his belief system and his values seem so all-over-the-place to me… and yet, somehow, magically, he feels like a perfectly organic human being. Which is what makes all the strangeness and madness and uncertainty so compelling! Dans le troisième tome, Riad met l'accent sur les différences culturelles entre l'Orient et l'Occident: il évoque les évènements religieux comme Noël et le Ramadan, la question de la religion d'une façon générale (aussi bien musulmane que chrétienne) et le contexte de sa circoncision [2 ]. Sonia Déchamp, « La véritable épopée de l' Arabe du futur», Les Cahiers de la bande dessinée, n o5,‎ octobre-décembre 2018, p.126-129 L'Arabe du futur relate l'enfance et l'adolescence de l'auteur en Libye, en Syrie, deux pays alors marqués par l'idéologie du socialisme arabe [1 ] et en France.Il se base principalement sur ses souvenirs, et cela explique les références régulières aux odeurs et le point de vue enfantin [5 ].

The Arab of the Future: A Graphic Memoir by Riad Sattouf". thearabofthefuture.com . Retrieved 2016-11-02. Julia Dumont, « L’Arabe du futur 2: l’enfance syrienne de Riad Sattouf séduit les lecteurs», sur france24.com, 14 juin 2015 (consulté le 28 septembre 2015). The Arab of the Future begins in France, where Riad Sattouf is born in 1978. He describes himself as a “perfect” little boy with "platinum-blonde hair" and “bright puppy-dog eyes.” Riad is the eldest son of Clémentine, a reserved French woman, and Abdul-Razak Sattouf, a flamboyant Sunni-Syrian man. They met when Clémentine took pity on Abdul-Razak's clueless failure to attract a friend of hers.In striking, virtuoso graphic style that captures both the immediacy of childhood and the fervor of political idealism, Riad Sattouf recounts his nomadic childhood growing up in rural France, Gaddafi's Libya, and Assad's Syria--but always under the roof of his father, a Syrian Pan-Arabist who drags his family along in his pursuit of grandiose dreams for the Arab nation. Purposefully written from the perspective of a child, Sattouf employs simplistic yet comprehensive drawings that are more rudimentary than, yet not entirely dissimilar to, his other works such as La vie secrète des jeunes, his column in the famous satirical French magazine Charlie Hebdo. [5] Both The Arab of the Future and La Vie Secrète des Jeunes are written from Sattouf's point of view, with the former describing his childhood and the latter his daily observations as an adult. Although both appear autobiographical, at least one reviewer calls into question elements of Sattouf's life story and family history. [2] In 2020, Sattouf announced the memoir's fifth volume was finished with only one extra volume pending before finalizing the saga. [6] Plot [ edit ] Vol. 1: 1978–1984 [ edit ] Sattouf doesn’t do anything particularly special with his style of storytelling, either literally or visually, he just tells it straightforwardly but he does it so well. He’s a natural storyteller who’s perfectly suited to the comics medium and that makes reading this such a joy. L'Arabe du futur est une série de bande dessinée autobiographique de Riad Sattouf créée en 2014 et publiée par Allary Éditions. La série compte 6 tomes.

a b c d Shatz, Adam (15 October 2015). "Drawing Blood". The New Yorker . Retrieved 4 February 2016.Riad’s Syrian father, Abdul-Razak, is the first of his family to read and is (therefore?) considered a great scholar in Syria. He is sent to study history at the Sorbonne and manages to wed an unworldly French student, Clementine, who is studying in Paris. Clementine is from a small village in Brittany and when they both graduate, Abdul-Razak accepts a position teaching in Tripoli, Libya. You have got to read this to enjoy it. I don’t want to spoil your fun. It sounds just about what you might expect with Qaddafi in charge, only even worse than you could imagine.

Riad Sattouf: «Avec L'Arabe du futur 4, je me suis libéré de mon secret de famille»», sur FIGARO, 27 septembre 2018 (consulté le 28 août 2019) Then as the family finally leaves - solely due to the father's own motivations yet again - the young son who is maybe 5 looks up and sees a woman with bare boobs through a window. Yes, this is considered an important enough life moment to be a highlight of a graphic memoir. JFC. L'Arabe du futur de Riad Sattouf remporte le Los Angeles Times Book Prize», sur L'Obs (consulté le 12 avril 2016) Comic books of childhood under Arab dictators grip France". France 24. 17 June 2015 . Retrieved 4 February 2016. This is the first part of Riad Sattouf’s childhood memoirs, The Arab of the Future, and it is superb! With a Syrian father and French mother, the small family travels across Europe as his father gets work as an associate professor in Tripoli, Libya, during Gaddafi’s reign, before briefly jumping to Brittany, France, and ending up in nightmarish Syria under Hafez al- Assad.Sattouf's father influenced the title of the memoir through his ideal of raising his son as an "Arab of the future." Early in the story, the elder Sattouf proclaims, "I'd change everything among the Arabs. I'd force them to stop being bigots, to educate themselves, and to enter into the modern world. I'd be a good President." This memoir in the form of a graphic novel by Riad Sattouf is positively terrifying. It only takes an evening to read, and I can guarantee you will not want to put it down. Le cinquième tome relate la vie de sa famille après l'enlèvement de Fadi, son plus jeune frère, par son père. Riad raconte le déchirement entre sa vie «d'adolescent» englobant ses questionnements sur son avenir, son cercle social et sa découverte du sentiment amoureux, et sa vie de famille marquée par l'enlèvement de Fadi, les moyens mis en œuvre pour le retrouver et l'image du père salie.