The Wolf of Baghdad E-Book

Carol Isaacs

• Herausgeber: Myriad Editions
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

'Enthralling and moving. It is magical.'—Claudia Roden In the 1940s a third of Baghdad's population was Jewish. Within a decade nearly all 150,000 had been expelled, killed or had escaped. This graphic memoir of a lost homeland is a wordless narrative by an author homesick for a home she has never visited. Transported by the power of music to her ancestral home in the old Jewish quarter of Baghdad, the author encounters its ghost-like inhabitants who are revealed as long-gone family members. As she explores the city, journeying through their memories and her imagination, she at first sees successful integration, and cultural and social cohesion. Then the mood turns darker with the fading of this ancient community's fortunes. This beautiful wordless narrative is illuminated by the words and portraits of her family, a brief history of Baghdadi Jews and of the making of this work. Says Isaacs: 'The Finns have a word, kaukokaipuu, which means a feeling of homesickness for a place you've never been to. I've been living in two places all my life; the England I was born in, and the lost world of my Iraqi-Jewish family's roots.'

Leseprobe

PRAISE FOR THE WOLF OF BAGHDAD ‘This isn’t a book that you read. It’s one where you actually fall inside the story. It’s wonderful. I loved it!’ Sandi Toksvig ‘A brilliant and truly transporting piece of work.’ JW3 ‘A tour-de-force - the moving story of the destruction of a community seen through the eyes of an Iraqi Jew - and a wolf. The most exciting animated audio visual experience since Persepolis.’ Lyn Julius, Harif ‘Enthralling and moving. It is magical.’ Claudia Roden

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Carol Isaacs is a musician and, as The Surreal McCoy, a well-known cartoonist published in the New Yorker, Spectator and Private Eye. The Wolf of Baghdad is also a motion comic (an animated slideshow) with its own musical soundtrack, which is often performed live by an ensemble that includes Isaacs on accordion, playing music of Iraqi and Judeo-Arabic origin.

THE WOLF OF BAGHDAD MEMOIR OF A LOST HOMELAND CAROL ISAACS THE SURREAL McCOY

First published in 2020 by www.myriadeditions.com Myriad Editions Myriad Editions An imprint of New Internationalist Publications The Old Music Hall, 106-108 Cowley Rd, Oxford OX4 1JE Copyright © Carol Isaacs (The Surreal McCoy) 2020 The moral right of the author has been asserted All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Dedicated with love and respect to my family, past and present, and to the people of Iraq

Dheeb. Wolf. In a house where children die in infancy, a wolf is kept in order to keep away demons. The belief is current among Baghdadi Jews that the wolf keeps away spirits and demons. In the dark they exclaim their fear wolf scratches the ground they believe he is pulling out and consuming the fingers of the approaching demons. From A History Of The Jews In Baghdad by David Sassoon, published 1917

LONDON - PRESENT DAY

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‘In this photo taken in the early ’30s, the grandmother, as you can see, is still in the old Turkish [Ottoman] garb while the younger generation is fully westernised.’ Nessim Hay - born Baghdad 1927, died Nottingham 2001 15

‘Our grandfather Nessim Hay [c.1880-1914] was conscripted into the Ottoman Empire army and never came back, presumed dead… You know, I still have my old Iraqi passport but I can never go back.’ Claire Isaacs, née Hay - born Baghdad 1925, died London 2008 16

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‘Our family had been living there [Iraq] for over two thousand years, since the destruction of the first temple in Jerusalem.’ Dr Heskell Isaacs - born Baghdad 1913, died Cambridge 1994 19

‘My mother was the granddaughter of Hakham Elisha Dangoor who was Chief Rabbi of the Baghdadi community in the 1870s. He was eldest cousin to Hakham Ezra Dangoor, also a Chief Rabbi.’ Claire Isaacs, née Hay 20