Back then, trips to buy bread or take the bus felt like adventures. Back then, I intended to make the world better by writing history and raising a family of cats with my boyfriend. Back then, I had a spacious apartment in Rabat’s Hay Hassan, right next to the twelfth-century minaret of the Almohad Sultan Yaqub al-Mansur. I lived in Morocco between 19 and am quick to tell people it was the best time in my life. T he reliance on these tenacious tropes, which exist even today, in my own era, make me want to redo Wharton’s trip…to make right all that my literary predecessor got wrong.īut as a woman in her fifties, I seek also to undertake a journey-both literally and spiritually-that allows me to see Morocco with fresh eyes. Instead, she puts forth fantastical descriptions of Oriental despots, medieval cities and harem girls. Wharton’s book, though, neglects this suffering. French troops swept into the Moroccan hinterland, wreaking havoc on those who refused colonial rule. At that time, France had drafted 35,000 Moroccans to fight its war in Europe, and 9,000 of these conscripted soldiers would never return. As a historian, I want to retell the tale of Morocco in 1917. This venture calls to me for professional and personal reasons. Every title has been reset in a contemporary typeface and printed to a high quality specification.Twenty years or more after first reading Edith Wharton’s travelogue In Morocco (1920), I have picked up my dog-eared copy and set about tracing her journey to the westernmost part of North Africa. Stanfords Travel Classics feature some of the finest historical travel writing in the English language, with authors hailing from both sides of the Atlantic. Her descriptions of the places she visited - mosques, palaces, ruins, markets and harems - are typically observant and brim with color and spirit, whilst her sketches of the country's history and art are rigorous but accessible.This is a wonderful account by one of the most celebrated novelists and travel writers of the 20th century and is a fascinating portrayal of an extraordinary country. Travelling from Rabat and Fez to Moulay Idriss and Marrakech, she recorded her encounters with Morocco's people, traditions and ceremonies, capturing a country at a moment of transition from an almost unknown, road less empire to a popular tourist destination. A seemingly unlikely chronicler, Wharton, more usually associated with American high society, explored the country for a month by military vehicle. Edith Wharton journeyed to Morocco in the final days of the First World War, at a time when there was no guidebook to the country.In Morocco is the classic account of her expedition.
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