A House In Fez

Author : Suzanna Clarke
Publisher : Gallery Books
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2008-11-11
Category : Travel
ISBN : 1416578935

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A House in Fez by Suzanna Clarke Pdf

The Medina -- the Old City -- of Fez is the best-preserved, medieval walled city in the world. Inside this vibrant Moroccan community, internet cafes and mobile phones coexist with a maze of donkey-trod alleyways, thousand-year-old sewer systems, and Arab-style houses, gorgeous with intricate, if often shabby, mosaic work. While vacationing in Morocco, Suzanna Clarke and her husband, Sandy, are inspired to buy a dilapidated, centuries-old riad in Fez with the aim of restoring it to its original splendor, using only traditional craftsmen and handmade materials. So begins a remarkable adventure that is bewildering, at times hilarious, and ultimately immensely rewarding. A House in Fez chronicles their meticulous restoration, but it is also a journey into Moroccan customs and lore and a window into the lives of its people as friendships blossom. When the riad is finally returned to its former glory, Suzanna finds she has not just restored an old house, but also her soul.

Author : Suzanna Clarke
Publisher : Viking
Page : 293 pages
File Size : 45,6 Mb
Release : 2007-01-01
Category : Buildings
ISBN : 0670070351

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A House in Fez by Suzanna Clarke Pdf

When Suzanna Clarke and her husband Sandy McCutcheon bought a dilapidated house in the Fez Medina, their friends in Australia thought they were mad. Located in a maze of donkey-trod alleyways, the house - an Arab-style riad - was beautiful but in desperate need of repair. Walls were in danger of collapse, the plumbing non-existent. While neither Suzanna nor Sandy spoke Arabic and had only a smattering of French, they were determined to restore the house to its original splendour, using traditional craftsmen and handmade materials. So began a remarkable experience that veered between frustration, hilarity and moments of pure exhilaration. But restoring the house was only part of their immersion in the rich and colourful life of this ancient city. A House In Fez is a journey into Moroccan culture - into it's day-to-day rhythms, its customs and festivals. Into its history, Islam, and Sufi rituals. Into the lore of djinns and spirits. And above all, into the lives of all of the people - warm, friendly, hospitable to a fault.

Author : Paul Bowles
Publisher : Harper Collins
Page : 432 pages
File Size : 43,6 Mb
Release : 2011-11-15
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9780062119360

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The Spider's House by Paul Bowles Pdf

Set in Fez, Morocco, during that country's 1954 nationalist uprising, The Spider's House is perhaps Paul Bowles's most beautifully subtle novel, richly descriptive of its setting and uncompromising in its characterizations. Exploring once again the dilemma of the outsider in an alien society, and the gap in understanding between cultures—recurrent themes of Paul Bowles's writings—The Spider's House is dramatic, brutally honest, and shockingly relevant to today's political situation in the Middle East and elsewhere.

Author : Manon Istasse
Publisher : Springer
Page : 293 pages
File Size : 51,8 Mb
Release : 2019-07-03
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9783030174514

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Living in a World Heritage Site by Manon Istasse Pdf

Through a thick ethnography of the Fez medina in Morocco, a World Heritage site since 1981, Manon Istasse interrogates how human beings come to define houses as heritage. Istasse interrogates how heritage appears (or not) when inhabitants undertake construction and restoration projects in their homes, furnish and decorate their spaces, talk about their affective and sensual relations with houses, face conflicts in and about their houses, and more. Shedding light on the continuum between houses-as-dwellings and houses-as-heritage, the author establishes heritage as a trajectory: heritage as a quality results from a ‘surplus of attention’ and relates to nostalgia or to a feeling of threat, loss, and disappearance; to values related to purity, materiality, and time; and to actions of preservation and transmission. Living in a World Heritage site provides a grammar of heritage that will allow scholars to question key notions of temporality and nostalgia, the idea of culture, the importance of experts, and moral principles in relation to heritage sites around the globe.

Author : Tahir Shah
Publisher : Bantam
Page : 368 pages
File Size : 50,8 Mb
Release : 2006-01-31
Category : Travel
ISBN : 9780553902310

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The Caliph's House by Tahir Shah Pdf

In the tradition of A Year in Provence and Under the Tuscan Sun, acclaimed English travel writer Tahir Shah shares a highly entertaining account of making an exotic dream come true. By turns hilarious and harrowing, here is the story of his family’s move from the gray skies of London to the sun-drenched city of Casablanca, where Islamic tradition and African folklore converge–and nothing is as easy as it seems…. Inspired by the Moroccan vacations of his childhood, Tahir Shah dreamed of making a home in that astonishing country. At age thirty-six he got his chance. Investing what money he and his wife, Rachana, had, Tahir packed up his growing family and bought Dar Khalifa, a crumbling ruin of a mansion by the sea in Casablanca that once belonged to the city’s caliph, or spiritual leader. With its lush grounds, cool, secluded courtyards, and relaxed pace, life at Dar Khalifa seems sure to fulfill Tahir’s fantasy–until he discovers that in many ways he is farther from home than he imagined. For in Morocco an empty house is thought to attract jinns, invisible spirits unique to the Islamic world. The ardent belief in their presence greatly hampers sleep and renovation plans, but that is just the beginning. From elaborate exorcism rituals involving sacrificial goats to dealing with gangster neighbors intent on stealing their property, the Shahs must cope with a new culture and all that comes with it. Endlessly enthralling, The Caliph’s House charts a year in the life of one family who takes a tremendous gamble. As we follow Tahir on his travels throughout the kingdom, from Tangier to Marrakech to the Sahara, we discover a world of fierce contrasts that any true adventurer would be thrilled to call home.

Author : Abdellah Hammoudi
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 226 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 1997-10
Category : History
ISBN : 0226315274

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Master and Disciple by Abdellah Hammoudi Pdf

In the postcolonial era, Arab societies have been ruled by a variety of authoritarian regimes. Focusing on his native Morocco, Abdellah Hammoudi explores the ideological and cultural foundations of this persistent authoritarianism. Building on the work of Foucault, Hammoudi argues that at the heart of Moroccan culture lies a paradigm of authority that juxtaposes absolute authority against absolute submission. Rooted in Islamic mysticism, this paradigm can be observed in the drama of mystic initiation, with its fundamental dialectic between Master and Disciple; in conflict with other cultural forms, and reelaborated in colonial and postcolonial circumstances, it informs all major aspects of Moroccan personal, political, and gender relations. Its influence is so pervasive and so firmly embedded that it ultimately legitimizes the authoritarian structure of power. Hammoudi contends that as long as the Master-Disciple dialectic remains the dominant paradigm of power relations, male authoritarianism will prevail as the dominant political form. "Connecting political domination to gift exchange, ritual initiation, social loyalty, and gender reversals, Master and Disciple is nothing less than a thoroughgoing revision of our understanding of authoritarian rule in Morocco and in the Arab world in general."—Clifford Geertz, Institute for Advanced Study

Author : Miranda Innes
Publisher : Random House
Page : 368 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2012-03-31
Category : Travel
ISBN : 9781446421994

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Cinnamon City by Miranda Innes Pdf

STEP INTO THE DREAMLIKE CITY OF MARRAKECH Where passionate music, magic potions and the drama of Africa are cooled by the intuitive genius of Arabic culture. Miranda Innes and her partner were lured into buying a beautiful long-neglected riad in the heart of this pink-walled city. Only after they'd begun their restoration work did they find that nothing in this place of smoke and mirrors was quite what it seemed. In Cinnamon City Miranda Innes takes you beyond the tourist track, behind the bolted doors and deep inside the romance that is Marrakech. With lyrical and evocative descriptions of the swirling colours, flavours and aromas, this glorious book will open your eyes to this most exotic of North African cities.

Author : Walter Harris
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 390 pages
File Size : 53,7 Mb
Release : 1921
Category : Morocco
ISBN : UCAL:$B57935

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Morocco that was by Walter Harris Pdf

Author : Jeremy Seal
Publisher : Pan Macmillan
Page : 304 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2016-02-11
Category : Travel
ISBN : 9781509827411

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A Fez of the Heart by Jeremy Seal Pdf

Jeremy Seal set out across Turkey, in the extremes of winter, to trace the astonishing history of a cone-shaped hat. He soon saw the fez as the key by which Turkey, beset by contradiction, might be understood. ‘Almost all you could ever need to know about modern Turkey, modern Turks and their one-time headgear. Extremely well written and very funny’ Eric Newby ‘Original and beautifully observed, the book reads like Chatwin with jokes’ Independent ‘Intelligent, funny and informative travelogue . . . Not so much a book about hats as a skilled and entertaining portrait of modern Turkey’ Sunday Times ‘Armchair travellers can rarely have had such a delightfully eccentric guide as Jeremy Seal . . . weaves history, personal and illuminating observation into a sprightly seamless whole’ Scotland on Sunday

Author : Z. Guinaudeau,Madame Guinaudeau,Claudia Roden
Publisher : Serif Publishing
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2003
Category : Cookery, Moroccan
ISBN : 1897959435

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Traditional Moroccan Cooking by Z. Guinaudeau,Madame Guinaudeau,Claudia Roden Pdf

Moroccan cuisine is famous for its subtle blending of spices, herbs and honey with meat and vegetables. In Fez, the country's culinary centre, the cooking has numerous influences - Arab and Berber, with hints of Jewish, African and French. The country's classic dishes are the famous couscous, tagines or stews, and bistilla, an exquisite pie made with a flaky pastry. Capturing the atmosphere of Fez, cultural capital of the medieval Moorish world, Madame Guinaudeau takes us behind closed doors into the kitchens and dining rooms of the old city. She invites us to a banquet in a wealthy home, shopping in the spice market and to the potter's workshop; shares with us the secrets of preserving lemons for a tagine; shows us how to make Moroccan bread. Traditional Moroccan Cooking is the perfect introduction to a mouth-watering culinary heritage and a vivid description of an ancient and beautiful city. It offers a taste of the delights to be found in one of the world's great gastronomic centres.

Author : Kay Hardy Campbell
Publisher : Loon Cove Press
Page : 318 pages
File Size : 43,6 Mb
Release : 2021-05-15
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9780999074336

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The Sons of Fez by Kay Hardy Campbell Pdf

Moroccan tour guide Ibrahim brings a busload of students from a summer Arabic program to stay in the medina (old city) of Fez, right next door to a newly-opened time portal. When a student goes missing, Ibrahim looks for him and slips into the past, where they find themselves in a fight to save the city. Along the way they come face to face with the mysteries of the medina, where history lives around every corner.

Author : Fatima Mernissi
Publisher : Basic Books
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 53,8 Mb
Release : 1995-09-04
Category : Religion
ISBN : 0201489376

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Dreams Of Trespass by Fatima Mernissi Pdf

This "wonderful and enchanting" memoir tells the revelatory true story of one Muslim girl's life in her family's French Moroccan harem, set against the backdrop of World War II (The New York Times Book Review). "I was born in a harem in 1940 in Fez, Morocco..." So begins Fatima Mernissi in this illuminating narrative of a childhood behind the iron gates of a domestic harem. In Dreams of Trespass, Mernissi weaves her own memories with the dreams and memories of the women who surrounded her in the courtyard of her youth -- women who, without access to the world outside, recreated it from sheer imagination. A beautifully written account of a girl confronting the mysteries of time and place, gender and sex, Dreams of Trespass illuminates what it was like to be a modern Muslim woman in a place steeped in tradition.

Author : Barbara Parmenter
Publisher : University of Texas Press
Page : 172 pages
File Size : 40,9 Mb
Release : 2009-09-15
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 0292721722

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Year of the Elephant by Barbara Parmenter Pdf

Includes glossary and interview with the author.

Author : Tahir Shah
Publisher : Bantam
Page : 400 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2007-12-26
Category : Travel
ISBN : 9780553904536

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In Arabian Nights by Tahir Shah Pdf

Tahir Shah’s The Caliph’s House, describing his first year in Casablanca, was hailed by critics and compared to such travel classics as A Year in Provence and Under the Tuscan Sun. Now Shah takes us deeper into the heart of this exotic and magical land to uncover mysteries that have been hidden from Western eyes for centuries.… In this entertaining and penetrating book, Tahir sets out on a bold new journey across Morocco that becomes an adventure worthy of the mythical Arabian Nights. As he wends his way through the labyrinthine medinas of Fez and Marrakesh, traverses the Sahara sands, and tastes the hospitality of ordinary Moroccans, Tahir collects a dazzling treasury of traditional stories, gleaned from the heritage of A Thousand and One Nights. The tales, recounted by a vivid cast of characters, reveal fragments of wisdom and an oriental way of thinking that is both enthralling and fresh. A link in the chain of scholars and teachers who have passed these stories down for centuries like a baton in a relay race, Shah reaches layers of culture that most visitors hardly realize exist, and eventually discovers the story living in his own heart. Along the way he describes the colors, characters, and the passion of Morocco, and comes to understand why it is such an enchanting land. From master masons who labor only at night to Sufi wise men who write for soap operas, and Tuareg guides afflicted by reality TV, In Arabian Nights takes us on an unforgettable journey, shining a light on facets of a society that are normally left in darkness.

Author : Esther Freud
Publisher : Penguin UK
Page : 208 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2001-06-28
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9780141956121

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Hideous Kinky by Esther Freud Pdf

The thirtieth anniversary edition of a twentieth century classic - an unforgettable journey through 1960s Morocco, based on the author's own childhood For fans of Gerald Durrell's My Family and Other Animals, Laurie Lee's Cider With Rosie and Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat Pray Love Quirky, charming and suffused the footloose spirit of the sixties, this is the irresistible story of an English woman who decides on a whim to move herself and her two young daughters to Morocco. The ensuing adventure takes them through richly perfumed markets, dilapidated hotels and mystical Sufi retreats, via friendships and feuds, romances with nomadic street performers, hitch-hiking and nights camping by the coast - all seen through the eyes of a precocious five-year-old girl. Rediscover this transporting modern classic about the spirit of freedom, filled with the sights, smells and textures of twentieth century Morocco.