Hamza Ben Driss Ottmani

Hamza Ben Driss Ottmani (10 May 1940 – 30 May 2012) was a Moroccan economist and writer.

Biography

Hamza studied Aerospace engineering at École nationale de l'aviation civile (the French civil aviation university; promotion 1963^[1]) and was an economist graduate from ENSAE ParisTech.

He is known as a writer. His work focuses on his hometown, Essaouira.

His first book, "Une cité sous les alizés" ("a city under the trade winds"), is a historical study of Mogador-Essaouira from prehistory to World War II. He then turned to fiction but retained a strong historical basis.

In "Si Mogador m'était contée" ("If Mogador could talk"),^[2] the old narrator, Lalla Aïcha, revives twenty stories from the ignored past of the city.^[3] "Le Soldat qui venait de Mogador" ("The soldier who came from Mogador") tells the story of the trip to Mecca of Si Taieb El Ech Chiadmi Maskali, in 1912.

"Le Fils du Soleil" ("Son of the Sun") is a historical novel that tells the amazing story of Mustapha Zemmouri, better known under the name Estevanico, who was a Moroccan from the Azemmour region, was kidnapped by a Spanish man as a slave and brought to America where he became one of the first discoverers of Arizona and New Mexico.

Bibliography

• Hamza Ben Driss Ottmani, Une cité sous les alizés : Mogador des origines à 1939, Éditions La Porte, 1997, 356 p. (ISBN 978-9981889187)
• Hamza Ben Driss Ottmani, Le Fils du soleil : l'Odyssée d'Estevanico de Azemor, Éditions La Porte, 2006, 316 p. (ISBN 9789981889538)
• « Le Soldat qui venait de Mogador » (Ed. La Porte).
• « Si Mogador était contée » (Ed. Eddif).
• « Kaddour Benghabrit : Un Maghrébin hors du commun » (Ed. Marsam).

References