Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
his 1984
Legend and Life of Agoun'chich,
which served as a rallying cry for today's Ber-
ber Pride movement.
Author Tahir Shah moved his family from London to Casablanca to become a Moroccan
storyteller groupie, collecting tales for his
In Arabian Nights: In Search of Morocco Through Its Stor-
ies and Storytellers
.
Living to Tell
Still more daring and distinctive Moroccan voices have found their way into print over the
past two decades, both at home and abroad. Among the most famous works to be pub-
lished by a Moroccan author are
Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood
and
The
Veil and the Male Elite: A Feminist Interpretation of Women's Rights in Islam,
both by
Fatima Mernissi, an outspoken feminist and professor at the University of Rabat. In
Rabati author Leila Abouzeid's
Year of the Elephant
and
The Director and Other Stories
from Morocco,
tales of Moroccan women trying to reinvent life on their own terms be-
come parables for Morocco's search for independence after colonialism.
The past several years have brought increased acclaim for Moroccan writers, who have
continued to address highly charged topics despite repeated press crackdowns. Inspired by
Anfas/Souffles,
Fez-born expatriate author Tahar ben Jelloun combined poetic devices and
his training as a psychotherapist in his celebrated novel
The Sand Child,
the story of a girl
raised as a boy by her father in Marrakesh, and its sequel
The Sacred Night,
which won
France's Prix Goncourt. In
The Polymath,
2009 Naguib Mahfouz Prize-winner Bensalem
Himmich reads between the lines of 14th-century scholar and political exile Ibn Khaldun,
as he tries to stop wars and prevent his own isolation. Several recent Moroccan novels
have explored the promise and trauma of emigration, notably Mahi Binebine's harrowing
Welcome to Paradise,
Tahar ben Jelloun's
Leaving Tangier
and Laila Lalami's celebrated
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits
.
In
Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail,
Malika Oufkir describes her demotion from courtier to
prisoner after her father's plot to assassinate King Hassan II. Unsurprisingly, it was initially
banned in Morocco on its publication.
