In 1973, ABDELLAH TA A was born in the public library of Rabat in Morocco, where his father was the janitor and where his family lived until he was two years old. Acclaimed as both a novelist and filmmaker, he writes in French and has published eight books now widely translated, including Le jour de roi, which was awarded the prestigious French Prix de Flore in 2010. An adaptation of his novel L'Armee du salut was his first feature film, released in 2014, screened at major festivals around the world, and hailed by theNew York Times as giving "the Arab world its first on-screen gay protagonist." Taia made history in 2006 by coming out in his country, where homosexuality is illegal. His commitment to the defense of homosexuals in Muslim countries has made him one of the most prominent Arab writers of his generation-both "a literary transgressor and cultural paragon," according to Interview magazine. He has lived in Paris since 1998.
"Taïa sharply etches the anguish and ecstasy of his characters. He
is adept at depicting love for others as well as love for God,
alongside humanity’s capacity for great cruelty. This is an
undeniably powerful work.” -Publishers Weekly
"These linked stories combine a lightness of touch, a deep
lyricism, an openness to beauty and mystery, with an undercurrent
of daring, fierce, erotic energy and images of shocking brutality
and challenging complexity. Infidels manages to create a
picture of an entire world as well as tender portraits of the
individuals whose lives are so memorably dramatized here."
—Colm Tóibín
"Abdellah Taïa is one of the most original and necessary voices in
world literature. He writes about Morocco and Arab culture with
both intimacy and the sharp perspective of someone rejected by his
home. Infidels is among his best novels and depicts a
powerful story of mother and son, both at odds with convention.
With each novel Taïa grows as an artist and expands our knowledge
of what it means to be an outsider inside the Muslim world." —David
Ebershoff, author of The Danish Girl and The 19th
Wife
"This novel by a Moroccan writer resident in France recounts the
brutal life of a young gay Muslim who becomes a jihadi. Brought up
by a prostitute in a conservative milieu in Morocco, the boy takes
up with an older, European-born Islamic militant and moves to
Belgium. Against the charged backdrop of debates about
homosexuality’s place in Islam and Islam’s place in the West, the
novel’s chief success is its dramatization of the hypocrisies of
the pious. Addressing his mother, Taïa’s protagonist prophesies,
“Maman, one day you’ll be stoned to death by the very same people
who creep to the house each night to ask for your forgiveness and a
bit of pleasure.” -The New Yorker
|
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
