| Fatima Daas | |
| Birth Date: | 1995 |
| Occupation: | Novelist |
| Language: | French |
| Birth Place: | Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France |
| Alma Mater: | Paris 8 University Vincennes-Saint-Denis |
Fatima Daas (born 1995) is a French writer.[1] Her debut novel, The Last One (French: La Petite Dernière), follows the life of a young Muslim woman as she explores her sexuality, religion, and relationships while living in Clichy-sous-Bois, a suburb of Paris.[2]
Daas was born in Saint-Germain-en-Laye to an Algerian immigrant family.[3] Her family settled in the working-class Parisian suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois and she spent much of her childhood in the surrounding department of Seine-Saint-Denis. Daas is the youngest of three daughters and the only French-born.[4] Daas and her family are Muslims.[5] Daas is a lesbian and describes herself as an intersectional feminist.
Daas attended Lycée Alfred Nobel. As a lycéenne, Daas began writing and attended writing workshops led by the French mystery writer, Tanguy Viel. She went on to enroll at Paris 8 University Vincennes-Saint-Denis where she completed a Master's degree in creative writing.[6] As a part of her coursework, Daas wrote a novel over a period of 18 months that ultimately became The Last One.
The Last One was first published in French on August 20, 2020 when Daas was 25 years old and subsequently translated into English by Lara Vergnaud for publication on November 23, 2021.[7] Daas describes the novel as a work of autofiction as the life of the main character, who is also named Fatima Daas, parallels Daas' own. The book explores the intersection of the protagonist's identity as a queer Muslim woman studying and living in an immigrant-majority suburb where her identities both contradict and compliment one another. When discussing the seemingly conflicted nature of the character – and Daas' own – identities, Daas stated: "I didn’t suffer because of who I am. I was never ashamed of being a lesbian, but I was ashamed of the loneliness of being unable to talk about it. I wanted to transmit this feeling in my writing by inhabiting a character that refuses to choose, despite the external pressures of the world".
Fatima Daas is not Daas' real name. When asked, Daas has refused to share her real name to avoid involving her family in her career. Daas has stated that a pseudonym allows her to reinvent herself and, in turn, explore multiple identities through her work.
She cites the work and careers of Marguerite Duras, Abdellah Taïa, Athena Farrokhzad, Faïza Guène, Mehdi Charef, and Annie Ernaux as inspiration for her own writing. References to Duras and Ernaux appear throughout The Last One. At Paris 8, while working on The Last One, Daas met French filmmaker and novelist, Virginie Despantes, when the latter came to deliver a talk; Despantes encouraged Daas to continue working on her novel as it touched on subject matters rarely featured in French novels. Despantes went on to praise the published novel and offered a book endorsement that reads: "Fatima Daas carves out a portrait, like a patient, attentive sculptor…or like a mine searcher, aware that each word could make everything explode".