News

The latest issue of Tingis, the Moroccan American magazine of culture and ideas, includes a long review by Anouar Majid of my book, Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits.

I took the train to Fes yesterday to give a reading from Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits at the Moroccan Cultural Studies Centre at Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah University. The students had all read the book and some of my articles beforehand, so we had a very lively and thorough discussion after the reading. I was so impressed with their talent and intelligence–they asked good questions, tough questions, and I was thrilled to have such an engaged group of readers. My only regret is that it was such a short trip (I had to get back to Casablanca, and back to my desk) and I saw nothing of the city. I think the last time I was in Fes was when I was nine or ten, and I really want to go back and do a proper visit.

Valerie Trueblood–who contributed a guest recommendation here a little while ago–is interviewed over at the LBC about her novel, Seven Loves.

The February 15 issue of the New York Review of Books contains a letter by Gholam Reza Afkhami and over one hundred other Iranian intellectuals, writers, and artists, including Azar Nafisi, Marjane Satrapi, and Shahrnush Parsipur, contesting the Holocaust conference recently sponsored by the government of Iran:

We the undersigned Iranians,

Notwithstanding our diverse views on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict;

Considering that the Nazis’ coldly planned “Final Solution” and their ensuing campaign of genocide against Jews and other minorities during World War II constitute undeniable historical facts;

Deploring that the denial of these unspeakable crimes has become a propaganda tool that the Islamic Republic of Iran is using to further its own agendas;

Noting that the new brand of anti-Semitism prevalent in the Middle East today is rooted in European ideological doctrines of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and has no precedent in Iran’s history;

Emphasizing that this is not the first time that the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has resorted to the denial and distortion of historical facts;

Recalling that this government has refused to acknowledge, among other things, its mass execution of its own citizens in 1988, when thousands of political prisoners, previously sentenced to prison terms, were secretly executed because of their beliefs;

Strongly condemn the Holocaust Conference sponsored by the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Tehran on December 11–12, 2006, and its attempt to falsify history;

Pay homage to the memory of the millions of Jewish and non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust, and express our empathy for the survivors of this immense tragedy as well as all other victims of crimes against humanity across the world.

You can view the letter and its signatories here.

I came back home to Casablanca to news of Aboubakr Jamaï’s resignation from Le Journal Hebdo. Could things get any worse for the press in Morocco? Wait. Don’t answer that.