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Home > Translation > The World Bookshelf > Books > A Palace in the Old Village

A Palace in the Old Village

Award-winning, internationally bestselling author Tahar Ben Jelloun’s new novel is the story of an immigrant named Mohammed who has spent forty years in France and is about to retire. Taking stock of his life – his devotion to Islam and to his assimilated children – he decides to return to Morocco, where he spends his life’s savings building the biggest house in the village and waits for his children and grandchildren to come be with him. A heartbreaking novel about parents and children, A Palace in the Old Village captures the sometimes stark contrasts between old- and new-world values, and an immigrant’s abiding pursuit of home.

With a great sense of poetic sensibility, the author vividly depicts immigrant life in all its colours. Celebrating its many joys while also examining its trappings, he has forged this novel out of his own personal experiences.

‘Social realism meets magical realism in Tahar Ben Jelloun’s satisfyingly nuanced account of one immigrant’s life… written with surprising humour’
Financial Times

Author

Tahar Ben Jelloun

Tahar Ben Jelloun

Books

Leaving Tangier

A Palace in the Old Village

About My Mother

Tahar Ben Jelloun was born in Fez, Morocco in 1944. The year before Moroccan independence from France in 1956, his family moved to Tangier. He studied philosophy at the University of Rabat, and in 1966 was arrested alongside 94 other protestors for taking part in student demonstrations in Casablanca. He spent the following eighteen months in internment camps, here composing his first poetry. He occupied his mind with James Joyce’s Ulysses while in prison – a book smuggled in by his brother.

After his release, Ben Jalloun worked as a teacher of philosophy in Tetuan and Casablanca, before the government decreed that philosophy be taught only in classical Arabic. He sought exile in Paris in 1971, where he wrote for the magazine Souffles and studied for his doctorate in social psychology. His thesis on the sexual misery of North African immigrants in France was published in 1975 as The Highest Solitude. It was his first bestseller, though a prior novel, Harounda (1973) had already won him critical plaudits from Samuel Beckett and Roland Barthes.

Ben Jalloun has written for a range of European newspapers, including France’s Le Monde, Italy’s La Repubblica and Spain’s El País. He is also the recipient of a number of literary accolades, including the Prix Goncourt for The Sacred Night (1987), and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for This Blinding Absence of Light (2001).

Translator

Linda Coverdale

Linda Coverdale

Books

Leaving Tangier

Linda Coverdale is an award-winning translator. She has translated many classic works of modern French literature into English, including Roland Barthes, Emmanuel Carrere, Marie Darrieussecq, Annie Ernaux, Hervé Guibert, Sébastien Japrisot, Tahar Ben Jelloun, Phiippe Labro, Yann Queffélec, Jorge Semprun and Patrick Volodine.

Published by

Arcadia Books, 2011
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Award-winning, internationally bestselling author Tahar Ben Jelloun’s new novel is the story of an immigrant named Mohammed who has spent forty years in France and is about to retire. Taking stock of his life – his devotion to Islam and to his assimilated children – he decides to return to Morocco, where he spends his life’s savings building the biggest house in the village and waits for his children and grandchildren to come be with him. A heartbreaking novel about parents and children, A Palace in the Old Village captures the sometimes stark contrasts between old- and new-world values, and an immigrant’s abiding pursuit of home.

With a great sense of poetic sensibility, the author vividly depicts immigrant life in all its colours. Celebrating its many joys while also examining its trappings, he has forged this novel out of his own personal experiences.

‘Social realism meets magical realism in Tahar Ben Jelloun’s satisfyingly nuanced account of one immigrant’s life… written with surprising humour’
Financial Times

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