Oroppa

‘Nowhere in the ordered, dust-free archives of European memory’, we read in Safae el Khannoussi’s Oroppa, ‘was there any mention of this wonderous place which for years had been the subject of ominous allusions and nerve-wracking anecdotes’. The novel spins a web of characters and settings in which the paths of perpetrators and victims cross. From Amsterdam via Paris to Tunis and Casablanca, these paths lead back to the postcolonial era of ‘the years of lead’ in Morocco. Stefanie Ochel’s translation effortlessly recreates the sound of these narrative spaces. Oroppa makes its impact by defying conventional narrative logic. ‘It would be a shame’, writes the author in a letter, ‘to write a novel today while bowing to the tyranny of a plot’. With her book, she creates a narrative for the disenfranchised who would otherwise not be remembered on either side of the Mediterranean.
—Maha El Hissy

Safae el Khannoussi  (born 1994 in Tangier) came to Amsterdam, where she now lives, at the age of four. She is a writer and she teaches political philosophy. Her work centres on issues including exile, flight and the paradoxical existence of migrants. Her debut novel Oroppa was published in 2024. At the end of 2024, she was named literary talent of the year for 2025 by the newspaper de Volkskrant, while Het Parool chose Oroppa as the best book of 2024. In 2025 the novel won the De Boon Prijs and the Libris Prijs, awarded every year for the best Dutch novel.

Stefanie Ochel (born 1980 in Bonn) studied linguistics, English and German studies before working for several years as a teacher of German and translating, including at the University of Oxford. She has translated literature from English and Dutch, most recently novels by Valentijn Hoogenkamp, Lieke Marsman, Tomi Obaro, Nina Polak and Angelo Tijssens. After periods in Finland and the UK, she now lives in Berlin.