For Bread Alone (السيرة الذاتية #1)
Paul Bowles, Mohamed Choukri
Rated: 3.55 of 5 stars
3.55
· 20 ratings · 169 pages · Published: 01 Jan 1973
On moving to another province Mohamed learns how to charm and steal, and discovers the joys of drugs, sex and alcohol. Proud, insolent and afraid of no-one, Mohamed returns to Tangiers, where he is caught up in the violence of the 1952 independence riots. During a short spell in a filthy Moroccan jail, a fellow inmate kindles Mohamed's life-altering love of poetry.
The book itself was banned in Arab countries for its sexual explicitness. Dar al-Saqi was the first publishing house to publish it in Arabic in 1982, thirty years after it was written, though many translations came out before the Arabic version.
Translated by Paul Bowles.
Mohamed Choukri is one of North Africa's most controversial and widely read authors. At the age of twenty he decided to learn to read and write classical Arabic. He went on to become a teacher and writer, finally being awarded the chair of Arabic Literature at Ibn Batuta College in Tangier.
Paul Bowles, perhaps best known for his novel The Sheltering Sky, collaborated closely with Choukri on the translation of For Bread Alone.
The story of Choukri's life is continued in Streetwise.
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The 'السيرة الذاتية' series
3.55 · 20 ratings
journey · adult · drama · literary-fiction · steamy · classics · literary · fiction · action-adventure · audiobook · historical-fiction · contemporary · book · 20th-century
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