São Paulo – The Anglo-Afghan writer Tahir Shah will be in Brazil to talk about the storytelling tradition in Morocco. Shah has two books published in Portuguese by the publishing house Roça Nova and came to Brazil specially to promote one of them: “In Arabian nights”. In the end of 2013 the work was selected to be part of the Teacher’s Library (free translation), a reading incentive project of Rio de Janeiro’s Municipal Secretariat for municipal schools. The book was given to over 20,000 teachers.
The Anglo-Afghan writer participated in several events in Rio de Janeiro earlier this week and he will meet with his readers this Friday (26th) and Saturday (27th), in São Paulo. Shah lives in Casablanca, Morocco, and his book is based on conversations he had with halaqis, storytellers from the Arab country. He searched for them and their narratives after he was challenged to know Morocco better. According to the challenger, getting to know this tradition was the way to go.
This is the second book of the author and it is practically a second stage to his first work “The Caliph’s House”, where he narrates on his moving from England to Casablanca. The editor at Roça Nova, Laura Di Pietro, says that Shah purchased a crumbling mansion and renovated it. The son of an Afghan, but born in England, the author was already a husband and father when he decided to pursue a new lifestyle and moved to the Eastern country.
These two books written by Shah, whose works have been translated to over 20 languages, are travel books, that is, books which describe journeys. Di Pietro says that Roça Nova publishing house will launch another one of Shah’s books next year, "Sorcerer’s Apprentice ", about India. This was the first book written by the Anglo-Afghan and tells the story about an Indian magician who used to come to Shah’s father’s house when the writer was a child. After a while, the magician returned to his country and later the author went after him.
Tahir Shah is a journalist and also holds a degree in Foreign Affairs, in addition to being a documentary filmmaker and writer. Roça Nova was founded six years ago and Di Pietro read Shah’s work about Morocco in English, on a friend’s recommendation. She was precisely looking for a good travel book to launch through the publishing house when she fell in love with the book. The editor says Shah came to Brazil in two opportunities, when his books were launched, in 2008 and in 2009.
The author will be in a chat with readers in São Paulo this Friday, at 8:30pm, at Paço do Baobá, in the district of Butantã. On Saturday he will take part in events at Casa do Saber, at 11am, and at Bibliaspa Space, at 5pm. The meetings will be organized by Roça Nova publishing house.
Tahir Shah in São Paulo:
Paço do Baobá
Friday, September 26th
Rua Michael Kalinin, 64 – Butantã
8h30pm
Tickets: US$ 12.44
Casa do Saber
Rua Dr. Mario Ferraz, 414
Saturday, September 27th
11am
Bibliaspa
Rua Baronesa de Itu, 639
Saturday, September 27th
5pm
For further information:
www.rocanova.com.br (in Portuguese)
https://www.facebook.com/rocanovaeditora?fref=ts
Phone: (+5521) 25423041
*Translated by Rodrigo Mendonça
