Biography

Biography

Born in Fez, Morocco to a shopkeeper and his wife in December of 1944, Tahar Ben Jelloun is one of North Africa’s most successful post-colonial writers.  Winner of France’s Prix Goncourt, Ben Jelloun moved at eighteen from Fez to Tangier where he attended a French high school until enrolling at the Universite Mohammed V in Rabat in 1963.  It was at the university where Ben Jelloun’s writing career began.  Exposed to the journal Soufflés  (Breaths ) as well as the journal’s founder, poet Abdellatif Laabi, Ben Jelloun completed his first poems, publishing his first collection, Hommes Sous Linceul de Silence , in 1971.  After completing his Philosophy studies in Rabat, in 1971, Ben Jelloun immigrated to France.  In France, he attended the Universite de Paris, receiving his Ph.D. in psychiatric social work in 1975.  Along with providing material for his dissertation, La Plus Haute des Solitudes,  Ben Jelloun draws upon his experience as a psychotherapist for his creative writing.  His second novel, La Reclusion Solitaire  (later Solitaire ), is a fictionalized account of some of his patients’ dysfunction which was written in 1976.  Between 1976-1987 Ben Jelloun was regularly published and received awards, but it was not until his novel L’Enfant de Sable, (later translated as The Sand Child ) that he became well-known and recognized, with all of his novels since The Sand Child  being translated into English.  The sequel to L’Enfant de Sable , La Nuit Sacree  or The Sacred Night   is the work for which he received his most notable award, the Prix Goncourt in 1987.  Ben Jelloun now lives in Paris with his wife, Aicha, and his daughter, Merieme.

Themes

* Language
The use of language is an interesting factor in Ben Jelloun’s work.  Critics have maintained that Ben Jelloun is catering to a French audience.  After all, although Ben Jelloun is Moroccan and hence Arabic is his native language, he chose to write in  French.  Likewise, in his novel Les Yeux Baisses, a young Moroccan girl becomes enamored with the French language and wishes to be a French writer.  Some say it is difficult not to parallel this character’s situation with Ben Jelloun’s.  Ben Jelloun simply declares, though, "When I started to write it came normally to write in French...I feel freer when I write in French."  From this statement and others such as "Arabic is my wife and French is my mistress; and I have been unfaithful to both," it is obvious though that bilingualism is an integral part of his life as well as a theme in his works.  Regardless of Ben Jelloun’s inclination towards French or lack thereof, he is quite clever in incorporating languages into his writings.  For instance, in La Nuit Sacree , he refers to a woman waiting on people in the restroom as L’Assise  which in French means "the seated woman" and which in Arabic is translated into gellas, the title given to women who sit and wait on those in the restroom.  This use of duality of languages adds to the complexity and sophistication of his pieces.

* Moroccan culture
Although the language for some readers may be an obstacle, others argue that it is Ben Jelloun’s incorporation of Moroccan culture into his texts which alienates readers.  Situations unfamiliar to his audience may be difficult to relate to; therefore his stories may lose some legitimacy.  An obvious example is that of pretending that one’s daughter is a son in order to preserve one’s property and maintain one’s prestige.  Although this probably seems foreign to most, one could argue that the themes of gender identity and the way in which it relates to power and societal structure are pervasive throughout all cultures.  If the reader does not agree with this statement, he can simply take Ben Jelloun’s work as an entertaining tale rather than a social commentary.  However, it is just this latter aspect of Moroccan incidents or references that are disturbing for some critics.  Not only does Ben Jelloun write about Moroccan situations that may be seen by others as nonsensical and/or uncivilized, but he openly criticizes them.  Although this has resulted in the praise by, for example, women’s groups, critics protest that Ben Jelloun defends and appeals to Europeans through stereotyping and a skewed perception of Morocco.

* Surrealism
It has been said that Ben Jelloun is primarily a poet; therefore his writing style resembles that of a poet.  His work is concise yet full of poetic images and lyrical language.  Ben Jelloun is a story teller, but he also allows the reader to become involved in his magical world.  Dream-like states, hallucinations, and allusions to Andre Breton and the exquisite corpse each give Ben Jelloun’s work a magical intoxicated quality.  Unreliable narrators and different points of view of the same story add to the mystical atmosphere as well.  Ben Jelloun ends L’Enfant de Sable  with, "If any of you really wants to know how this story ended, he will have to ask the moon when it is full.  I now lay before you the book, the inkwell, and the pens."  This creative space for doubt and wonder gives the piece a surrealist quality.  After all, it may have simply been a fanciful tale, it may have been a true story.  One is not quite sure.

* Sexuality/ Dysfunction
Having received his doctorate for the relationship between sexuality and immigration into France of North African male workers, Ben Jelloun also is quite interested in sexuality and dysfunction.  The majority of his works have the protagonist suffering from some sort of dysfunction whether it be sexual, as in,  L’Enfant de Sable  or more physical, as in, L’Ecrivain Public.

The Sand Child/Sacred Night

Ben Jelloun’s first book translated into English, The Sand Child, catapulted him into the literary spotlight.  The themes of gender identity and a male-dominated society, of masking and storytelling, and surrealism provide the backdrop for a surreal story of secrets, sexuality and identity.  The main character, Ahmed, is the eighth daughter of man without an heir.  Raised as a boy, Ahmed eventually realizes she is a girl, but accustomed to her status of power as a male in Islamic society, decides to remain a man, even marrying her distant cousin Fatima.  Her desire to have children marks the beginning of her sexual evolution.  As a woman named Zahra, Ahmed discovers her true sexuality and her true identity.  The sequel, The Sacred Night,  completes Zahra’s transformation, with Zahra finding her life with a blind man named Consul.

 
http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Jelloun.html

Friendship Moroccan Style (from "The New Statesman")

Tahir Shah

Published 28 August 2006

When Tahir Shah moved to a crumbling house in Casablanca, he knew no one. Then he met Abdelmalik

A popular Moroccan proverb goes: "A man without friends is like a garden without flowers." It was told to me in the first week I arrived to live in Casablanca, almost three years ago, by a plumber who had turned up to clean out the drains. He seemed distraught that I could have moved to a foreign land where I knew no one at all. I told him that it felt liberating.

"I don't have to avoid people any more," I said, beaming. The plumber wiped a rag over the crown of his bald head.

"But how will you live if you don't have friends?" he asked.

Looking back to that first week, I now understand what he meant. For us in the west, friends are sometimes little more than people we go to the pub with so that we aren't there alone, but in Morocco, friendship is quite a different thing. It is a support structure par excellence, a system by which the old values of chivalry and honour are passed on. But more than that, it is some-thing that is actively nurtured and raised, like a seedling in a garden.

My story is not unusual. I had been lured to Morocco from London to escape the damp grey sky and the exorbitant costs of living in Britain. The house we found was quite grand, a thousand times larger than our London flat. It was located smack in the middle of a thriving shanty town.

Your learning curve is a steep one when you move to a new country. Over the first year, we renovated the house, exorcised the wayward djinns who supposedly inhabited it, and battled against the waves of conmen who beat a path to our door. At times, I would find myself wondering if I would ever find anyone in Casablanca who I could trust, a real friend. Then, one spring morning, I met Abdelmalik.

I was having my hair cut at a run-down barber's shop near to my house when a tall, suave man burst in and sat on the chair beside mine. He asked for a shave. A pair of dark glasses was worn like a tiara across his slicked-back hair. He smiled a great deal. I supposed he was in his late thirties. While the barber sharpened the cut-throat razor on a leather strop, the man made conversation.

He asked me if I missed England. "How do you know I've come from England?" I asked.

"Because you look too pale to be Moroccan and too content to be French."

The man's cheeks were shaved and anointed with a home-brewed cologne. He pressed a coin into the barber's hand. "I will wait for you at the café opposite," he said.

I was still unfamiliar with Moroccan society, and wondered if I should accept the invitation. But, unable to resist, I crossed the street and found the man, Abdelmalik Leghmati, sipping a café noir. We sketched out the broad details of our lives - wives, children, work - and we exchanged telephone numbers. He expressed his great love for Arab horses and his lifelong dream of owning one. It was an interest we both shared. We chatted about horses and life for an hour or more. Then Abdelmalik glanced at his watch.

"We will be friends," he said firmly, as he left.

From then on the suave, clean-shaven Moroccan swept into my life. He saw it as his duty to solve every one of my abundant problems and to help me settle in. First, he taught me local etiquette: how to make myself be regarded as a local, how to receive and entertain a Moroccan guest, and how to prepare the sweet mint tea that everyone drinks constantly.

From the outset, Abdelmalik stressed again and again that I could ask anything of him. It was his duty, as my friend, to be there for me. I found it strange at first that someone would make such a point about friendship, rather than just letting it develop. We'd meet at least every other day on the terrace of Café Lugano, near Casablanca's coastal road, where we always sat at the same table. I commented that the same people were usually sitting at the other tables as well.

"Of course, that's how it is," said Abdelmalik. "You see, they are friends."

In Morocco there is no occupation more honourable for a man than to be seen with his pals, sitting at a café, drinking sweet mint tea. In the west, we might frown on spending so much leisure time in such a way. For Moroccans, however, time spent working on a friendship in public is extremely important.

When I told an expatriate acquaintance about Abdelmalik, he waved his arms in caution.

"Beware!" he shouted. "Before you know it, this man will be demanding you to repay his kindness. What happens if he gets into a family feud?" The expatriate paused. "You could even find yourself at war," he said. "And all because you are his friend."

After we had known each other for a month, Abdelmalik invited me to his apartment. It was small, cosy and dominated by a low coffee table. On the table were laid at least ten plates, each one laden with sticky cakes, biscuits and buns. I asked how many other people had been invited.

"Just you," replied my host, confused.

"But I can't eat this much," I said.

Abdelmalik grinned like a Cheshire cat. "You must try to eat it all," he said.

A few days later, he called me and announced he had a surprise. An hour later, I found myself in the steam room of a hammam, a Turkish-style bath. For Moroccans, going to the hammam is a weekly ceremony. Abdelmalik taught me how to apply savon noir, and the ritual of gommage - scrubbing myself down until my body was raw. In the scalding fog of the steam room, he presented me with an expensive wash-case packed with the items I would need. When I choked out my thanks, embarrassed at the costly gift, he whispered: "No price is too great for a friend."

Months passed, and I found myself waiting for Abdelmalik's ulterior motive. I felt sure he would eventually ask me for something, some kind of payment for our friendship. Then, one morning, after many coffee meetings, he leaned over the table at Café Lugano and said:

"I have a favour to ask you."

I felt my stomach knot with selfishness.

"Anything," I mumbled, bravely.

Abdelmalik edged closer and smiled very gently. "Would you allow me to buy you an Arab horse?" he said.

Tahir Shah is the author of "The Caliph's House: a year in Casablanca" (Doubleday, £15)