KREA, HENRI

born Nov. 6, 1933, Algiers Algerian-born poet, dramatist, and novelist whose work deals with alienation and identity, nature, heroism, and moral and social change in Algeria. Like the hero of his first and only novel, Djamal (1961), Kra had a French father and an Algerian mother. He attended secondary school in Blida and later in Paris at the Lyce Henri IV. In 1956 he became a journalist and settled permanently in Paris. Kra published more than 20 collections of poetry, including Libert premire (1957; First Freedom), which deals with the Algerian war of independence; La Rvolution et la posie sont une seule et mme chose (1957; Revolution and Poetry Are One and the Same), and La Conjuration des gaux (1964; The Plot of the Peers). His plays include Le Sisme (1958; Earthquake) and Thtre algrien (1962). Tombeau de Jugurtha (1968; Fall of Jugurtha) is a historical biography.