Out of The Aeons 12: One Night in Fez...

You? Here? Again? How WONDERFUL! I'm so pleased you could make it - have some fresh mint tea, and settle in for the evening or morning, depending on the stars where you are... You're just in time for a slightly different approach to our Arcane Horology - an experiment in the process of divination, if you will. In seeking out this tale of terror we The Players have delved into stranger magics than previously - notably in the form of a rather more personal invocation than I have ever dared, and a more barely outlined one at that. A throwing together of constellatory notions perhaps? For the hour is 1912 and our destination is Fez - or Fes as many would put it. And everyone knows I was born in 1912* and I have indeed visited Fez...

French travel poster, M. Vicaire 1930 *Plus 65 years, give or take - but the horology calls me.

Such tangible Orientalism as "Fez La Mysterieuse" above reminds us of the complexity of the European view of North Africa. History is littered with mistakes and horrible ones at that - we've made no secret of that throughout our Aeons enquiries. For more eloquent takes on the reasons why we must tell tales that reveal those errors, and indeed that we must engage with history with some faithfulness in the process, so that the horror is not forgotten and the mistakes not glibly dismissed, I direct you to this excellent discussion between the writers of Teeth, Jim Rossignol and Marsh Davis (the point I refer to is about an hour and seven minutes in to the episode in question where they tackle historical horrors and why they want to write about the terrors of, in that particular case, British Imperial history). Suffice to say abuse of colonial power was and is a dreadful thing. Telling stories whereby we face the facts of the nature of it (as a route to wealth and power, not justice), can help to show it as the crude device it truly was (as a route to wealth and power, not justice) and reveal that we ourselves can find catharsis in dismantling it, while not whitewashing the problem. This is surely a good thing we can take away from such a time and such a place as Fez in 1912.

First, a little history. Since the Entente Cordiale of 1904, the European Powers had been focussed on matters in Morocco and, if not openly colonising for wealth and resources, then offering essential, but crippling loans to pay off war indemnities amassed during the 19th Century . The jockeying for European power in North Africa had been exacerbated by the Agadir Crisis of 1911, where Great Britain, Germany and France fell to sabre rattling over the issue of the deployment of French troops in the country, resulting in the German Fleet arriving at Agadir and the ensuing crisis raising the spectre of international war.  The resulting peace was tentative. Only a year later France was able to make further crippling claims for repayment for vast overspending by the Moroccan government, known as the Makhzen. Arriving in Fez on the 25th March, 1912, French diplomats, under Eugene Regnault (dubbed "the fortunate negotiator") and backed by a considerable military force outside the city, passed a decree making Morocco all but a puppet state under French control, naturally presenting this under the guise of offering security to the Moroccan people. So it was that, on March 30th, 1912, Moulay Abdelhafid, Sultan of Morocco signed the Treaty of Fez, making it a French Protectorate.

Moroccan Scene, Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1912 (Birmingham Museum of Art)

European presence in Morocco—in the form of advisors, doctors, businessmen, adventurers, and missionaries— had dramatically increased after the Madrid Conference of 1880, held at the behest of Sultan Hassan I in response to France and Spain's abuse of the protégé system. The Makzhen were spending vast sums on indemnities, weapons, military equipment, and manufactured goods, all under the watchful eye of European and American advisers. Evidence of these adventurers is hard to come by, but wherever there is power, there are the brokers, go-betweens and reporters of it...

Adventurers seen through the Colonial lens...a French postcard with an agenda (artist unknown).

Where there is power there is also art and enquiry. The artist Henry Ossawa Tanner visited Morocco in 1912 and his luminous, nuanced pieces of the time suggest a fascination with the place that reached beyond mere orientalism and towards a deeply spiritual understanding. An African American artist who studied in Philadelphia and then Paris, his later works delve further into symbolism and never leave the expanse of the Mahgreb too far behind. The shadows of war were thrown long across North Africa and this could not be lost to the eye of a skilled observer, even enthralled to the perspective of the time (during WWI Ossawa Tanner painted some remarkable pieces of soldiers behind the lines). In the aftermath of the treaty of Fez, riots, mutinies and uprisings occurred almost immediately. The diplomat Regnault was replaced by General Lyautey who would lead the occupying forces. The Mellah was shelled by French forces barely a month after signing the act of Protection and for years rebellious tribes in the mountains would seek independence from both their French and Spanish "rulers".

The Good Shepherd (Atlas Mountains, Morroco), Smithsonian 1930, Henry Ossawa Turner

When I reached Fez at the tender age of 16 in the early-ish 90s I had only Raiders of The Lost Ark, Casablanca and my schoolboy history to help me parse the landscape of North Africa. That and the remarkable Bernardo Bertolucci film, The Sheltering Sky with Debra Winger and John Malkovich (at least remarkable to an impressionable 16 year old) adapting Peter Bowles’ opaque but enthralling existential novel of the same name. I was guilty of somewhat selfishtly translating the Orientalism into something sensual and palatable, of course - a guilt that all fans of Indiana Jones must face in their journey of loving the otherness of where Dr Jones takes us, but not always knowing how to pay the narrative bill. The complex relationship we have to the perspective we have as observers outside of Africa, be it North, South, East or West, is one I must continue to work at. I am, however, not here amidst the Aeons to debate the errors of the subjective gaze - we must all take responsibility for that. But I do want to celebrate the human power of an ancient place: Fez.

Photo Mikelle Hembre

I have never walked anywhere as strange and yet as somehow known to me as the Medina in Fez. From the tannery to the mosque, from the blind corner of a hidden alley - the tenth turned in a row, as it might seem to the wandering tourist - to the courteous, welcoming forecourt of a teahouse, offering refreshment and respite from the heat, no city has felt more human or more unknown in just such a way. Even the name of the place twists and turns when not written in Arabic - be it Fez or Fes it moves a little with its own life. On that strange family holiday - only the second I had ever taken outside of Europe - Fez made both an indelible and shifting mark on me that I could not forget. And so the moment the Horology offered up a greater question of how France became too involved in the matter - of how the fate of Morocco went on to tune the coming clarion call for The War to End All Wars, I could not resist.

Sodom and Gomorrah, Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1929

The Great War did come. The Treaty of Fez played its part in bringing it to the world. Henry Ossama Tanner’s vision of the great plain swept with clouds of darkness came to fruition via many such treaty signatures and abuses of colonial power. There are more questions asked by the true history of what came to pass in Fez on the night of the 29th of March, 1912 than there are answers. Had kinder eyes and wiser hearts been watching and acting, perhaps a different path could have been taken that night. But here the Apocalypse Players present the true historie of a few adventurers, agents, trouble makers, revolutionaries and anti-imperialists. We allow you the readers and players to seek out the shared understanding, both human and monstrous, of that singular, unrelenting and illuminating night in Fez…