São Paulo – Moroccan literature bears the influence of Latin American surrealism. The literature of Morocco also has great storytellers. And both features – surrealism-tinged tales from the Arab country – are going to be to the Brazilians, in Portuguese, starting this month. The book Contos Marroquinos Modernos (Modern Moroccan Tales) will be placed at bookstores by the Almádena publishing house, based in Rio de Janeiro. The official release is due November 27th to 29th at book fair Primavera dos Livros (Spring of Books), at Museu da República, in Rio.
The book tells stories such as that of a headless man who makes his last request to God: to fly. He leaves North Morocco and heads for the South, and, at the square in Marrakech, he disturbs tourists and workers. He tells them that they must not sit there telling stories that will lead them nowhere. For that, the headless man is put on trial, in which the judge is an old corpse. Having left the grave recently and flattered by the invitation, the corpse issues his sentence: the man will receive his head back, but his tongue will be cut off.
The book comprises nine tales. The first one is the one described above, entitled A história da cabeça decepada (The story of the beheaded head). The book is an initiative of the owner of the Almádena publishing house, João Baptista de Medeiros Vargens, and was translated from the Arabic by seven professors of the Arabic Studies Department at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), from which Baptista holds a baccalaureate. The first selection, of thirty Moroccan tales, was made by the Union of Moroccan Writers. Out of those, Baptista Vargens picked nine to be translated and published.
Vargens lived in Morocco for three years, where he worked as a professor of Portuguese Language and Brazilian Culture, at the University of Tetuán, as part of an agreement with the UFRJ. The intermediating party for the selection of the tales, on behalf of the Union of Moroccan Writers, was the former Moroccan ambassador to Brasília (the Brazilian capital), Mohamed Larbi Messari, who once was the minister of Information of the Arab country, and is a member of the Union. “The tales have political, allegoric undercurrents, with a clear influence of Latin American surrealism,” explains Vargens.
The release aims to show the Brazilian publishing industry other options of Arabic literature. According to the owner of Almádena, presently, Egyptian literature and works such as the One Thousand and One Nights are better known in Brazil. By means of his publishing house, Vargens wants to bring Brazilian readers the literature from other Arab countries. He believes that the book of Moroccan tales should appeal to a very diverse audience. “Tales are a much appreciated genre, due to their size, and then there is also the Moroccan exoticness,” he claims.
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Contos Marroquinos Modernos
Publishing house: Almádena – Rio de Janeiro
Pages: 96
Price: 19 Brazilian reals (US$ 11)
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum