cover image Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood

Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood

Fatema Mernissi. Addison Wesley Publishing Company, $23 (242pp) ISBN 978-0-201-62649-0

This rich, magical and absorbing growing-up tale set in a little-known culture reflects many universals about women. The setting is a ``domestic harem''in the 1940s city of Fez, where an extended family arrangement keeps the women mostly apart from society, as opposed to the more stereotypical ``imperial harem,'' which historically provided sex for sultans and other powerful court officials. Moroccan sociologist Mernissi ( Islam and Democracy ) charts the changing social and political frontiers and limns the personalities and quirks of her world. Here she tells of a grandmother who warns that the world is unfair to women, learns of the confusing WW II via radio news in Arabic and French, watches family members debate what children should hear, wonders why American soldiers' skin doesn't reflect Moroccan-style racial mixing and decides that sensuality must be a part of women's liberation. With much folk wisdom--happiness, the author's mother told her, ``was when there was a balance between what you gave and what you took''--this book not only tells a winning personal story but also helps to feminize a much-stereotyped religion. Photos. BOMC and QPB selections. (June)