Tales from the Middle East

by Staff -- Publishers Weekly, 7/18/2005

Three years ago, Philomel editor Patricia Lee Gauch was visiting her daughter in Cairo, Egypt, when she ran across a funny little book character. Stories about this character, Goha, have been passed around the Middle East for centuries. "I read the stories and they were very funny," said Gauch. "I really wanted to bring these stories back to [U.S.] children. They throw up a mirror to the foibles of human beings." This August, Philomel will publish an anthology of these tales, Goha the Wise Fool , translated by Denys Johnson-Davies, who has translated several works by Nobel Prize–winning author Naguib Mahfouz.

When thinking about how to illustrate the project, Gauch first considered Ed Young, who has done Middle Eastern work before, but then realized the book would feel more authentic with a local artist. The chosen illustrators, Hag Hamdy and Hany, are Egyptian tentmakers who were found by Gauch and her daughter on Cairo's Street of the Tentmakers. While the artists don't speak English, Gauch's daughter speaks Arabic, and Gauch says "she explained to them which stories we were going to use."

The artists submitted sketches to Gauch, then "about six to eight months later," the artwork arrived. Each of the 15 hand-sewn tapestries (called khiyamiyas) are three feet long by three feet wide; they were photographed for the book and will be on display at the Donnell Public Library in New York City this fall.