Tahir Shah

Tahir Shah (Persian: طاهر شاه, Gujarati: તાહિર શાહ; né Sayyid Tahir al-Hashimi (Arabic: سيد طاهر الهاشمي); born 16 November 1966) is a British author, journalist and documentary maker of Afghan-Indian descent.

Family

Tahir Shah was born into the saadat of Paghman, an ancient and respected family hailing from Afghanistan. Bestowed with further lands and ancestral titles by the British Raj during the Great Game, a number of Shah's more recent ancestors were born in the principality of Sardhana, in northern India – which they ruled as Nawabs.

His mother, Cynthia Kabraji, was of Zoroastrian Parsi descent and his father was the Indian Sufi teacher and writer Idries Shah. Both his grandfathers were respected literary figures in their own right: Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah on his father's side, and the Indian poet Fredoon Kabraji, on his mother's side. His elder sister is the documentary filmmaker Saira Shah, and his twin sister is the author Safia Nafisa Shah. Numerous other members of Shah's family have been successful authors, including his aunt Amina Shah, and his Scottish grandmother Elizabeth Louise MacKenzie.

Shah is descended from the Afghan warlord and statesman Jan-Fishan Khan. In 1995 Shah married the India-born graphic designer Rachana Shah (née Devidayal), with whom he has two children – Ariane Shah and Timur Shah. The marriage ended in 2017, although the two remain close friends.

Childhood

Shah was born in London and brought up in Langton House a Georgian country house in the Kent village of Langton Green. The property had been owned previously by the family of Robert, Lord Baden-Powell, founder of the'Boy Scout Movement. Shah has described how, as a child, he played in the woods which are said to have first interested Baden-Powell in the outdoors.

Shah's father, the writer and thinker Idries Shah, surrounded himself with a diverse coterie of people, most of whom were interested in his published work. They included Nobel Laureate Doris Lessing, poet Robert Graves, American novelists J. D. Salinger and Lisa Alther, psychologist Robert E. Ornstein, as well as the pioneer of radar "Coppy" Laws, the garden designer Russell Page, and the actor Walter Gotell. Shah maintains that much of his education derived from spending time with such a varied group of people.

His first appearance on television was in the 1972 BBC documentary about his father, Dream Walkers: One Pair of Eyes, in which Shah, his sisters, and their friends, are seen listening to Idries Shah tell the tale of The Lion Who Saw Himself in the Water.

Shah has described how his Latin tutor appeared at the front door "white as a sheet", at having spotted the renowned classicist Robert Graves digging a ditch at the front of Langton House; and how Doris Lessing encouraged him to read folktales and, later, encouraged his enthusiasm for travel.

During his childhood, Shah and his sisters would be taken to Morocco for extended periods, where his grandfather lived until his death in November 1969. Described in his book The Caliph's House, the journeys introduced Shah to "a realm straight out of The Arabian Nights".

Education

Tahir Shah attended Rose Hill Preparatory School in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. At 13, he was sent to Bryanston School, near Blandford Forum, Dorset. He has written about his inability to keep up, as a result of "profound dyslexia".

Aged 17, Shah learnt to fly in Florida, and graduated with an FAA Private Pilot's Licence. He attended university in San Diego, London and Nairobi, where he studied African dictatorships at the United States International University. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations in 1987.

Writing

Tahir Shah is a prolific author of books, documentaries, book introductions, peer reviewed academic articles, and book reviews. Shah's first published book was Cultural Research, written for the London-based Institute for Cultural Research. One of his more notable works is Trail of Feathers, an account of his trip through Peru, Machu Picchu, the Incas and Cusco. Another book, In Search of King Solomon's Mines, searching for undiscovered mines known only in folklore. Other books like In Arabian Nights and Travels with Myself are mostly about the author's journeys through exotic locations. His first traditional travelogue was in 1995 with Beyond the Devil's Teeth, covering a trip through Africa, India and much of Latin America.

Shah has written book reviews for The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Spectator, and The Literary Review. As well as writing and film making, Shah writes screen material and co-wrote Journey to Mecca, an IMAX film charting the first journey made by Ibn Battuta to Mecca for the Hajj, in 1325. In addition, he reviews for a selection of other media on both sides of the Atlantic, and writes pieces for the radio, such as The Journey, which was read on BBC Radio 3.

In the years before he turned his hand primarily to book writing, Shah wrote a large number of serious reportage-type magazine features, highlighting the lives of the voiceless in society, especially those of women. These included pieces about women on Death Row, widows who cleared mines in Cambodia, the trapped lives of bonded labourers in India, and the women-only police stations in Brazil, known as "Delegacia da Mulher" (Woman's Police Station). He continues to write journalistic pieces, especially aimed at drawing attention to causes he believes deserve public attention.

After publishing several books through traditional publishers, Shah self-published Travels With Myself in 2011 using Lulu.com. He later self-published the limited-edition hardcovers Timbuctoo (2012) and Scorpion Soup (2013).

Documentaries

Shah has presented several documentaries, all of which have followed the quest theme, which have appeared on National Geographic TV, The History Channel, Channel 4, & Channel 5: The Search for King Solomon's Mines, House of the Tiger King, and Search for the Lost Treasure of Afghanistan.