Tangier: A Literary Guide for Travellers

by Josh Shoemake

An edge city, poised at the northernmost tip of Africa, just nine miles across the Strait of Gibraltar from Europe and overlooking both the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, Tangier is more than a destination, it is an escape, and the Interzone, as William Burroughs called it, has attracted spies, outlaws, outcasts and writers for centuries - men and women working out at the edge of literary forms, breaking through artistic borders. This outlaw originality is what most astonishes when encountering the literary history of Tangier for the first time. Particularly in the past century, the results were some of the most incendiary and influential books of our time, the most prominent being Burroughs' Naked Lunch and Bowles' The Sheltering Sky. The list of "edge" writers who were drawn to Tangier is long, among them Ibn Battuta, Samuel Pepys, Alexandre Dumas, Mark Twain, Edith Wharton, Walter Harris, Jean Genet, Paul and Jane Bowles, Tennessee Williams, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, Patricia Highsmith, Jack Kerouac, Truman Capote, Gore Vidal, Allen Ginsberg, Alfred Chester, Joe Orton, and Mohamed Choukri. This is a book that will capture the unconventional, multilayered story of literary Tangier and will be a must-have for travellers, armchair adventurers and literature buffs, particularly aficionados of the Beat generation writers and poets who made the city their home.

Genres: Travel, Morocco

288 pages, Hardcover

First published May 30, 2013

About the author

Josh Shoemake was born in Richmond, Virginia and attended Columbia University, after which he spent several years teaching high school literature at the American School of Tangier, then became headmaster of The American School of Marrakesh. He now lives in Paris and has published a number of stories and books, both fiction and non-fiction, including a history of literary Tangier, which was named a a Book of the Month in The Sunday Times, and one of Condé Nast Traveller’s all-time best travel books.

Reviews

[Grady · Rating 5 out of 5]

`Tangier doesn't make a man disintegrate but it does attract people who are going to disintegrate anyway' Paul Bowles

Eyes wide open, promises kept. After reading Josh Shoemake's debut novel, this reviewer wrote the following: `The talent inherent in Josh Shoemake is staggering. If this novel PLANET WILLIE is indicative of what we can expect from this young, movie star handsome writer then watch out! The literary world could just be set back on its heels. This is experimental writing at its finest - novel in concept, droll in delivery, packed with double entendres, and yet for all of its literary display of skill it remains a novel that is fascinating as a story - from page one to the end. So what do we know of Josh Shoemake? It is tough to find much biographical information, so that little bit must be quoted: `Josh Shoemake was a reader in English at Columbia University. He has lived in Morocco since 1996. He spent three years in Tangier, where he taught literature and formed close friendships with Paul Bowles, Mohamed Choukri, and other local artists and writers. He then served for five years as headmaster of The American School of Marrakech and has published stories about Tangier in The Threepenny Review and elsewhere.' Born in Virginia in the United States, Shoemake is making his life along the lines of the other famous ex-pat writers - good company, good experience, good influence, and it definitely shows.'

The above bears repeating because this, his second foray into the literary scene, is even more impressive than that first novel. TANGIER: A Literary Guide for Travelers is as fragrant as the lotus blossom that apparently originated in this locale. Shoemake takes us on an imaginary trip of sorts, combining all of the impressive writers and poets who spent time in this exotic Moroccan city that looks from the northern most tip of Africa toward the far different climes of Gibraltar and all of Europe. His characters are drawn from acquaintances and for the powerful and decadent cortege of writers who have Tangier such a seductive locale: Ibn Battuta, Samuel Pepys, Alexandre Dumas, Mark Twain, Edith Wharton, Walter Harris, Jean Genet, Paul and Jane Bowles, Tennessee Williams, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, Patricia Highsmith, Jack Kerouac, Truman Capote, Gore Vidal, Allen Ginsberg, Alfred Chester, Joe Orton, and Mohamed Choukri. But it is the manner in which Shoemake makes these giants interrelate - his weaving particular places with events and memories or myths that keeps the reader stunned. This is surely on of the best books of the year -at least for readers who thrive on literary history. Josh Shoemake has firmly arrived.

Grady Harp

[Sere · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked this book: the story of Tanger through its literary contributors and contributions.
Writers found themselves in this city, lost themselves in this city, reinvented themselves in this city.

This is the city whose own writers spoke a language with no written form; when they started writing they were free of language structures (i.e. the virus for Burroughs) and only followed their oral tradition. They started off by recording stories on tape (with Paul Bowles who would then translate and write for them) and later chose between writing in French or classic Arab.

This is a city of magic and wonder; somebody might whisper your name right behind you...don't look back! It might be Aisha Kandisha, the most beautiful girl on the planet! You will fall in love with her and be forever lost. Don't look back!

Reality and fiction collide and it doesn't matter where the truth lies; nothing is true everything is permitted; layer over layer over layer; observe, recount, forget, do, restart. Don't look back.

[Eamonn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is easily one of those essential books in trying to uncover the literary landscape of Tangier over the last 100 years. It is a perfect armchair travel read, a relishing insight into the hedonistic iconoclastic personalities of the interzone era and a practical guidebook when walking around Tangiers literary trails today.
I used this book during a recent trip to Tangier and I still dip into it as a resource today at home.
It really really does deserve five stars as it does exactly, over and above, what the title says.

[Vel · Rating 4 out of 5]

''If I said that Tangier struck me as a dream city, I should mean it in the strict sense. Its topography was rich in prototypal dream scenes: covered streets like corridors with doors opening into rooms on each side, hidden terraces high above the sea, streets consisting only of steps, dark impasses, small squares built on sloping terrain so that they looked like ballet sets designed in false perspective, with alleys leading in several directions; as well as the classical dream equipment of tunnels, ramparts, ruins, dungeons, and cliffs . . . a doll's metropolis.''

--PB

[Brenda Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a book I normally would read - Travelers guide? But I have loved Paul Bowles for so long and I have planned a trip to Tangier in the spring so I had to read this book. But it is more than it seems; it is history, great literature of its own, and philosophy all so beautifully entwined I couldn’t stop reading. I digested it in very little time. I think this is how all travel books should read. Plan on being near a computer as you read it, however. I googled places and characters and have learned so much (don’t forget www.joshshoemake.com/maps). Don’t miss this ride!

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

A essential read for those with a literary bent who are travelling to Tangier. I'm on my way late October staying at Hotel el Muniria where Burroughs stayed and wrote Naked Lunch and was also visited by Kerouac, Ginsberg and Corso. Can't wait to be woken by the morning call to prayer and to view the soul at night from the roof terrace listening to what Burroughs termed "a vast Moslem muttering"

[Anne Wood · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great literary walk through the city of Tangier, a must read if you plan to visit.

[Ariadna73 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this little, yet dense book with a lot of quotes from different writers who dearly describe this magical land. Tangier is the only place in the world that makes me wish I were a man for a few days, so I could go there to visit with no fears.