who is Tahar Benjeloun?

Tahar Benjeloun is a Moroccan novelist and poet. The entirety of his work is written in French, although his first language is Arabic.

Early life and studies

• Tahar benjeloun was born in Fes on December 1st, 1944.
• After first having attended the local coranic school, he switched to the bilingual (French-Moroccan) primary school the age of 6.
• Ben Jalloun studied French in Tangier, Morocco until he was 18 years old.
• He obtained my baccalaureate in 1963 and continued his studies in philosophy at Mohammed-V University in Rabat.
• On March 23, 1965 because of student demonstrations in larger Moroccan cities there were a lot of repression and arrests.
• On July 1966 his philosophy studies were interrupted; he was sent to a disciplinary camp run by the army together with 94 other students suspected of having organized the March 65 demonstrations.
• In January 1968, he was liberated and returned to university.
• In October 1968 he got his first teaching assignment. The same year he published his first poem “l’Aube des dalles” in the magazine “Souffles”. He wrote the poem in secret at the camp.
• After this point, he worked as a teacher in Morocco, teaching philosophy first in Tetouan and then in Casablanca. 
• Then he left teaching after the arabization of the philosophy department, unable or unwilling to teach in Arabic. He moved to Paris to continue his studies in psychology, and began to write more extensively. 
• Starting in 1972, he began to write articles and reviews for the French newspaper [Le Monde], and in 1975 he received his doctorate in social psychiatry. Using his experience with psychotherapy as both a reference and an inspiration, he wrote the book La Réclusion solitaire in 1976.
• n 1985 he published the novel "L'Enfant de sable," which was widely celebrated. He won the Prix Goncourt in 1987 for his novel La Nuit Sacrée. 
• In 1997 he saw his novel Le Racisme expliqué à ma fille published, wherein he "explains racism to his daughter," using his family as inspiration for his novels. Ben Jalloun is regularly asked to give speeches and lectures at universities worldwide - both in Morocco, and all over Europe.
• In 2004 he was awarded the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for This Blinding Absence of Light (translated from the French by Linda Coverdale). He was rewarded the Prix Ulysse in 2005 for the entirety of his work
• In September 2006, he was awarded a special prize for "peace and friendship between people" at Lazio between Europe and the Mediterranean Festival.
• On 1 February 2008, Nicolas Sarkozy awarded him the Cross of Grand Officer of the Légion d'honneur.
• Ben Jelloun is married and father of 4 children. He lives in Paris.
• In his novel, Leaving Tangier, Ben Jelloun writes about a Moroccan brother and sister who leave their impoverished home in search of better lives in Spain.
• His novels L'Enfant de sable and La Nuit sacrée are translated into 43 languages. Le racism expliqué à ma fille has been translated into 33 languages. He has participated in translating many of his works.  

Selected works

• Solitaire (1976)
• The Sand Child (1985)
• The Sacred Night (1987)
• Silent Day in Tangiers (1990)
• With Downcast Eyes (1991)
• Corruption (1995)
• The Fruits of Hard Work (1996)
• Praise of Friendship (1996)
• L'Auberge des pauvres, (1997)
• Racism Explained to My Daughter (1998)
• Islam Explained (2002)
• This Blinding Absence of Light (2003)
• La Belle au bois dormant, (2004)
• The last friend, (2006)
• Yemma, (2007)
• Leaving Tangier, (2009)
• The Rising of the Ashes, (2009)

Source:Wikipedia and Tahar Benjelloun's official site