Anti-Imperialist Struggle and the Production of Third-Worldist Solidarity in the Political Theater of Yūsuf al-ʿĀnī and Kateb Yacine

Abstract This article examines the influence of Third World internationalist politics in two dramatic texts, al-Miftāḥ by Yūsuf al-ʿĀnī (Iraq, 1968) and L'homme aux sandales de caoutchouc by Kateb Yacine (Algeria, 1970), paying particular attention to the form of the works and their explicit references to anti-imperialist struggles. The article argues that these references are incorporated into the structure of the drama in such a way as to incite in the audience conscious engagement with international liberation struggles, in the interest of producing Third World solidarity. The article also offers a reflection on reading twentieth-century political theater in the shadow of Bertolt Brecht, recognizing both his international influence and other possible ways of understanding literary history that his renown partially obscures.