Salvation Army (Semiotext(e) / Native Agents) - Softcover

Taia, Abdellah

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1584350709 ISBN 13: 9781584350705

Publisher: Semiotext(e), 2009

Synopsis

An autobiographical coming-of-age novel by the the “only gay man” in Morocco.

An autobiographical novel by turn naïve and cunning, funny and moving, this most recent work by Moroccan expatriate Abdellah Taïa is a major addition to the new French literature emerging from the North African Arabic diaspora. Salvation Army is a coming-of-age novel that tells the story of Taïa's life with complete disclosure—from a childhood bound by family order and latent (homo)sexual tensions in the poor city of Salé, through an adolescence in Tangier charged by the young writer's attraction to his eldest brother, to a disappointing arrival in the Western world to study in Geneva in adulthood. In so doing, Salvation Army manages to burn through the author's first-person singularity to embody the complex mélange of fear and desire projected by Arabs on Western culture. Recently hailed by his native country's press as “the first Moroccan to have the courage to publicly assert his difference,” Taïa, through his calmly transgressive work, has “outed” himself as “the only gay man” in a country whose theocratic law still declares homosexuality a crime. The persistence of prejudices on all sides of the Mediterranean and Atlantic makes the translation of Taïa's work both a literary and political event. The arrival of Salvation Army (published in French in 2006) in English will be welcomed by an American audience already familiar with a growing cadre of talented Arab writers working in French (including Muhammad Dib, Assia Djebar, Tahar Ben Jelloun, Abdelkebir Khatibi, and Katib Yasin).

About this title

About the Author

Abdellah Taïa (born in 1973) is the author of six novels, including Salvation Army and An Arab Melancholia, both published by Semiotext(e), and Infidels. His novel Le jour du roi, about the death of Morocco's King Hassan II, won the 2010 Prix de Flore. He also directed and wrote the screenplay for the 2013 film adaptation of Salvation Army.

Reviews

Taïa's slim and disjointed autobiographical coming-of-age story begins in poverty in Salé, Morocco, where young Abdellah reports on the impoverished town's doings. As a young adult, he falls for an older man who introduces him to Europe and the possibility of leaving home and its repressive social mores behind. But the story feels haphazard, and the narrative hinges on a string of taboo-breaking accounts of Taïa's amorous encounters, from his incestuous desire for his older brother to his troubled first love, then a threesome, then a random encounter in a public toilet. For all its frank sexuality and candor, the novel feels canned and unconvincing. (Mar.)
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Edition details

• Publisher: Semiotext(e)
• Publication date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1584350709
• ISBN 13: 9781584350705
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 144