Abdourahman A. Waberi 
Why Do You Dance When You Walk? 

‘Papa, why do you dance when you walk?


When Aden’s 8-year-old daughter asks him this one morning in Paris, he is taken aback. The question is innocent, but the answer is not so simple. Unable to resist Béa’s inquisitive spirit, he moves silkily between memories of his childhood: from his silent, mysterious mother and the shanty roofs of his neighbourhood to the malicious attack that changed his life forever and the ensuing struggle that made him a man.


Anchoring his memories is a Djibouti on the cusp of independence; a land of shifting deserts and immense heat, French-from-France ex-pats, and one lonely and sick boy finding solace in books.


Why Do You Dance When You Walk is a poignant and timeless story of the complexity of family, the value of poetry and freedom, and the ripple effect of the traumas that stalk our movement.

About the author

Together or separately, Nicole and David Ball have published twenty book-length translations from the French, mostly novels by contemporary French authors. David, a Professor Emeritus at Smith College, has won two major prizes for his translations. Nicole also translates from English to French, most recently Youssef Daoudi’s graphic biography of Thelonious Monk, which won the 2018 French Jazz Academy Prize. Now both retired from teaching, they spend their time between Paris (Nicole’s hometown) and in the US, Northampton (Massachusetts)
and San Francisco.