Arabic Literature

A Wild Patience has Brought my Sister so Far

Eman book

In 1999 I began writing an article about women’s psychological health in Jordan. Finding data in a conservative society was extremely hard. One of the top psychiatrists in the country agreed to be interviewed and he said, ‘To be brief: about 40% of men are schizophrenic and 50%of women are depressed.’ But to find case studies and write a robust academic paper was impossible.
Like American women in the 1950’s, when the number of housewives on tranquillisers was on the rise, many Jordanian women are unhappy or even depressed. They are finding it difficult to be ‘perfect housewives’ and conform to assigned gender roles. Many are trying to break out of the constraints of an unbalanced domestic life within a male-dominated society. Due to their dissatisfaction divorce rates are rising in changing society. Power structures are shifting.
The Black Jasmine: my Journey with Depression, written by my sister Eman Faqir, is ground-breaking because it tackles these issue head on with extreme honesty. It is an autobiographical text about suffering from depression most of her adult life. She briefly describes her journey from diagnosis, to taking a cocktail of different antidepressants and tranquillisers, to submitting to electric shock therapy. Admitting to having depression and seeking treatment for it is mundane in western societies but is an act of bravery in the duplicitous and hypocritical Jordanian society.
In one of the chapters she talks about her list of phobias: speaking in public, agoraphobia, claustrophobia etc. This develops into finding communication with other people draining. The life of the depressed person is a lonely one. ‘I sit on the sofa folding the laundry, which I waited so long for it to dry on the balcony because autumn has started. The sky is cloudy, and the cold wind carried distant barking to my ears and tossed dry yellow and red leaves into the sitting room. I don’t like this season with all its yellowness and dryness. When I was young, in my twenties, I used to love autumn and winter, and consider them the seasons of romance. I played songs about autumn leaves, rain, snow, small cafes. I would listen to Julio Iglesias’ song ‘Autumn Leaves’ sitting by the window and gazing at the sky. Life was full of promise then. Regrettably events knocked all romance out of me and replaced it with realism and depression.’
One poignant chapter is about people’s reaction to her depression. She lists the types of reactions she gets, which were mostly negative and accusatory. Many told her that her depression is due to her lack of belief and piety. Some said that she should exercise more and eat healthy food, others used stronger terms like ‘pill-popper’ and ‘self-inflicted’. Many stopped communicating with her afraid of catching her depression as if it were contagious. This reminded me of Susan Sontag’s book Illness as a Metaphor, which deals with the stigma surrounding illness. The ill deserve their illness because they are not passionate enough or for some reason brought upon themselves.
The book is simple, honest, and does not expose all the causes behind her depression, apart from her son’s diabetes and the collapse of her business, yet it is pioneering. Although it is a summery it is an act of bravery in a society that oppresses and terrorises women. Jordanian women must remain sweet and silent, but Eman Faqir is one of the few who spoke out. This is the tremor before the earthquake. Watch out for her next book.
•  Title echoes Adrienne Rich’s poem ‘A Wild Patience Has Taken Me This Far’

الصبر(الجامح – الوحشي) قد أوصل أختي إلى هنا

في عام 1999 بدأت في كتابة مقالٍ عن الصحة النفسية للمرأة في الأردن. وقد كان العثور على بياناتٍ في مجتمعٍ محافظٍ لأمراً في غاية الصعوبة. في حينها، وافق أحد كبار الأطباء النفسيين في البلاد على إجراء مقابلةٍ وقال: “باختصار”  حوالي (40%) من الرجال مصابون بالفُصام، و (50%) من النساء مصاباتٍ بالإكتئئاب. ولكن العثور على حالاتٍ للدراسة للتمكّن من كتابةِ تقريرٍ أكاديميّ متين كان أمراً مستحيلاً

مثل النساء الأمريكيات  في خمسينات القرن الماضي، عندما كان يتزايد عدد “ربات البيوت” اللاتي يستخدمن المهدئات، فإن العديد من النساء الأردنيات تعيساتٍ ومكتئبات. حيث يجدن صعوبة في أن يكونوا ” ربات بيوتٍ مثالياتٍ” يلتزمن بأدوار جندريّة كرّسها المجتمع. يحاول الكثير منهنّ الخروج من قيود الحياة المنزلية الغير متوازنة في مجتمعٍ يهيمن عليه الذكور. لذلك سترتفع عدلات الطلاق بسبب عدم الرضا مما سيعمل على تغيير المجتمع لأن هياكل السلطة تتغير

تعتبر رواية “الياسمينة السوداء: رحلتي مع الإكتئاب” التي كتبتها أختي إيمان الفقيروالتي صدرت عن الآن ناشرون وموزعون، رائدة لأنها تعالج هذه القضية في أمانة قصوى.إنه نص للسيرة الذاتية حول معاناتها معظم حياتها من الإكتئاب. حيث تصف بإختصاررحلتها من التشخيص الى تناول كوكتيل من مضادات الإكتئاب والمهدئات العصبية الى الخضوع للعلاج بالصدمات الكهربائية. إن الإعتراف بالإكتئاب والسعي للعلاج لأمر شائع فيالمجتمعات الغربية، ولكنه لعمل شجاع في مجتمع  تسود به المعايير المزدوجة و يعم به النفاق

تتحدث في أحد الفصول عن قائمة الهلع  (الفوبيا) الخاصة بها: التحدث في الأماكن العامة، اضطرابات القلق والخوف من الأماكن المغلقة…. الخ. ويتطور هذا الى حد تجد به التواصل مع اشخاص أخرين مرهق ومتعب. إن حياة الشخص المكتئب تتسم بالوحدة. “أجلس على الكنبة، أرتب الغسيل الذي انتظرته مطوّلاً ليجف على الشرفة، لأن الخريف قد بدأ. السماء ملبدة بالغيوم، وقد حملت الرياح الباردة نباح كلبٍ أسمعه من بعيد  وقذفت أوراق الخريف الصفراء والحمراء الجافة الى غرفة الجلوس. أنا لا أحب هذا الموسم بكل لونه الأصفر وجفافه. عندما كنت صغيرة, في عمري العشرينيّ، كنت أحب فصليّ الخريف والشتاء واللذان طالما اعتبرتهما موسميّ الرومانسية. كنت أبحث عن الأغاني التي تتعلق بأوراق الخريف والشتاءِ والثلج والمقاهي الصغيرة. حيث كنت أجلس بجانب النافذة و أستمع الى أغنية  “أوراق الخريف” لخوليو اغليسياس وأحدق في السماء.عندها كانت الحياة مليئة بالوعود. مع الأسف الحياة قتلت كل الرومانسية في داخلى واستبدلتها بالواقعية والإكتئاب

ومن أحد الفصول المؤثرة هو حول ردود فعل الأشخاص الاخرين على إكتئابها، فقد سردت فيه أنواع ردود الأفعال التي تلقتها، والتي كانت أغلبها سلبية وتوجيه الإتهام إليها. فقد اخبرها الكثيرون أن سبب اكتئابها يعود إلى إفتقارها للإيمان والتقوى، وقال البعض أنها يجب أن  تقوي إيمانها وتزيد من ممارستها للرياضة وبأن تتناول طعاماً صحياً. بينما استخدم البعض الآخر وصفٍ أكثر شدّةً مثل ” مدمنة الأدوية” و”المحبحبة” و “المسبّبةُ ذلك لنفسها”. لقد توقف الكثيرون من التواصل معها خشية الإصابة بالإكتئاب كما لو أنه مرض معدي. وقد ذكرني هذا بكتاب “المرض كمجاز” لسوزان سونتاج، الذي يتعامل مع وصمة العار المحيطة بالمرض. حيث أن المرضى يستحقون مرضهم لأنهم ليسوا أصحاب إرادةٍ أو شغوفين بما فيه الكفاية، أو لسببٍ ما كانوا قد جلبوا المرض لأنفسهم

الكتاب بسيط وصادق، ولا يكشف جميع الأسباب الكامنة وراء إكتئابها، بإستثناء إصابة ابنها بمرض السكري وهو صغير وإنهيار أعمالها، إلا أنه رائد. وعلى الرغم من أنه موجز/ مختصر إلا أنه عمل شجاع في مجتمع يتم فيه قمع كثير من النساء وترويعهنّ. يجب أن تبقى المرأة لطيفة وصامتة ولكنّ إيمان الفقير هي واحدة من القلّة اللاتي تحدّثن

هذا الكتاب هو الهزة ماقبل الزلزال. إنتظروا كتابها القادم

Alta’ir Durham-Jordan Exchange 2019 no hi

 

Alta’ir is a partnership project between the Durham Book Festival/New Writing North (co-founder), the British Institute in Amman/Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL) (co-founder), St Aidan’s College, Durham University (co-founder), and Dr Fadia Faqir (initiator and co-founder).

The project aims to encourage dialogue with Jordan and the Arab world through literature. The cultural exchange and dialogue that it will enable and create, will open windows for non-Arab audiences in the UK onto the realities of Arab cultures in all their diversity and vibrancy, enabling fruitful discourse to develop. It is hoped that this will lead to further exchange, to mutual respect, to new writings, and deeper understanding.

Why?

“We live in dark times and are witnessing the return of fascism. As an Arab woman I go to sleep and wake up the next morning criminalised although completely innocent. Constantly misrepresented and deformed by the British Media, I started to feel insignificant and helpless. To empower myself and marginalised others like me and to counter the rise of racism and xenophobia, I began thinking about a project that could be an antidote to the toxic culture of hate prevailing all over the world. An exchange programme between Jordan and Durham seemed a fitting way of challenging preconceptions and creating spaces for conversations and meaningful dialogues between civilisations, peoples and writers.
“I was born in Amman and spent the first third of my life there, then I studied and taught at different universities in the UK, but 25 years ago I settled in Durham. It was time to give back to my hometown Amman and to Durham, the city that adopted me, and what better way of doing that than shining a light on the writings of Jordanian authors and poets and their counterparts based in the North East of England. So, as a Jordanian/British writer I initiated the exchange programme to give back to both cities, which are part of mental landscape and fiction.”  _ Fadia Faqir, initiator and co-founder of Alta’ir.

British Author Who Went to Jordan
Andrew Michael Hurley (born 1975) is a British writer whose debut novel, The Loney, was published under Hodder and Stoughton’s John Murray imprint in 2015. It is the winner of the 2015 Costa Book Awards First Novel Award as well as the British Book Industry award for best debut fiction and book of the year 2016. His second novel, Devil’s Day, was published on 19 October 2017 by John Murray and Tartarus Press and was joint winner of the Royal Society of Literature’s 2018 Encore Award for the best second novel. Hurley has previously had two volumes of short stories published by the Lime Tree Press (Cages and Other Stories, 2006, and The Unusual Death of Julie Christie and Other Stories, 2008). He lives in Lancashire, where he teaches English literature and creative writing.
Andrew Michael Hurley began his stay in Jordan with a welcome lunch at the British Institute in Amman/CBRL. The lunch was hosted by: Dr Carol Palmer, the director of the institute, and Mr Firas Bqa’en, Operations Manager for CBRL, and was attended by author Fadia Faqir, the initiator of Alta’ir exchange program, HE Haza’a Albarari, first secretary of the Ministry of Culture, authors Kafa Al-Zoubi, Mofleh Aladwan, and Jalal Bargas, and architect and artist Ammar Khammash. The delicious lunch was cooked to perfection by Um-Mohamad.
Andrew then visited The House of Poetry in Amman on 3 September 2019. Located in Jabal al-Jofeh, the house, which is a fine example of 1930’s architecture, is now a home to poetry recitals, cultural activities and a database of Jordanian poets and poetry.  From its large veranda and garden, you can see the Citadel on the opposite hill and the Roman Amphitheatre in the valley, at the heart of Amman’s city centre. The visit was kindly organised by writer Mofleh Aladwan, director of the Royal Cultural Centre, and Ms Shima Al Tall, head of Dept of Culture at Amman Municipality.
Andrew spent a few days in Wadi Fynan, Wadi Rum and Petra and went back to Amman through the King’s Highway passing by Tafilah, Kerk and Madaba. Mr Ammar Khammash took him on a tour of the Eastern Desert. He also visited Bethany, the Dead Sea, and Madaba.
The Narrative Lab in Amman organised a meeting for him with Jordanian writers at the Shoman Foundation. It was chaired by Mofleh Aladwan and attend by Carol Palmer, director of the British Institute in Amman and co-founder of Alta’ir, Firas Bqa’in, Operations Manager for CBRL’s British Institute in Amman, Fadia Faqir, writing fellow at St Aidan’s College, Durham University, and initiator and cofounder of Alta’ir, and Rachel Telfer,  UK executive officer at CBRL, and the following Jordanian writers: Fida’ Al Hadidi, Kafa Al Zoubi, Muhammad Jamil Khader, Khairi Al-Dhabi, Kawthar al-Jondi, As’ad Khalifa Mekhled Barakat, Kawthar Khalid al-Zoubi and Hashim Gharaibeh.
Andrew spoke about visiting Wadi Fynan, ‘This valley was one of the routes our distant ancestors took during their migration from Africa to Europe and so to touch the water here is to touch what binds us all. And now the name of the project that’s brought me to Jordan – Alta’ir, the bird, the flying one – makes complete sense. It’s a reminder of our shared aspiration for freedom and flow. From the sky, the bird sees nothing but an open world.’ Read the full text here

Writer Who Came to Durham
Kafa Al-Zoubi is a Jordanian writer, born in 1965. She obtained a BA in Civil Engineering from Saint Petersburg University, Russia, where she remained until 2006. She is the author of six novels. Her second book, Laila, the Snow and Ludmilla (2007) dealt with the collapse of the Soviet Union and questions of Arab and Russian identities and was published in Russian in Moscow in 2010. Her fourth novel Go Back Home, Khalil (2009) was published only in Russia. Her fifth novel S was translated into Spanish in 2018. Her sixth novel, Cold White Sun, a multi-layered, modernist novel, with a trace of post-modernity, in which the social realism of great Russian literature is mixed with absurdism and existential philosophy, was shortlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2019 (OKA Arabic Booker). Kafa Al-Zoubi writes for the Jordanian and Arab press and lives in Amman, Jordan.
Kafa stayed at St Aidan’s College, Durham University between 3-17 October 2019. New Writing North/Durham Book Festival invited her to a welcome dinner at Indigo Hotel on 4 October. Then she met Leila Aboulela, who was speaking at the festival. Kafa attended the Gordon Burn Prize Ceremony at the Gala Theatre and the private view of Mr Ammar Khammash’s exhibition and the following special dinner.
Al-Zoubi and Hurley spoke at the Durham Book Festival on 12 October 2019 about their writing and their impressions of the countries, cities and the towns they had visited. Andrew read an extract from his novel Devil’s Day and Kafa read a few lines in Arabic and then Ouissal Harize, translator and interpreter, read her full testimony. Issues related to colonialism, orientalism, misrepresentation, and inclusion were also discussed.
A talk at the School of Modern Languages and Cultures was jointly organised for Kafa before her departure by the Arabic and Russian departments.

Artist Who Came to Durham
To accompany the writers’ exchange an exhibition of Jordanian artist Ammar Khammash’s work will open to the public between 11-17 October at St Aidan’s College, Durham University. Ammar Khammash is one of the more prominent artists to come out of the Middle East in the 21st century and is a multi-talented Jordanian who has made his mark in several disciplines. He held eighteen solo and participated in over 20 group exhibitions since 1978. His paintings are multi-layered and transmit the richness of Jordanian landscape and his deep knowledge of the terrain, its geology and history. http://www.khammash.com/art
Mr Ammar Khammash arrived in Durham to attend the private view of his solo exhibition at St Aidan’s College, Durham University and the following special dinner on 11 October. He attended the Gordon Burn Prize Ceremony and Alta’ir event at the Durham Book Festival.
On October 13 he went with Kafa Al Zoubi on a tour of Housesteads Roman Fort, Hadrian’s Wall, and Roman Vindolanda Fort and Museum. Then attended an Art Tour organised by the Curator of Western Art at Durham University.
On October 14 poet Linda France, Alta’ir fellow 2018, led a creative writing workshop entitled ‘Ancient Landscape’ on Ammar Khammash’s art. The workshop was a rare opportunity to explore these dramatic landscape paintings at close hand and consider the poetry of place. It experimented with the rich possibilities of ekphrastic writing – giving words to our in-the-moment sense of the artist’s vision – transported to Jordan’s spectacular terrain.

Farewell Lunch
On October 15 a farewell lunch was organised for Kafa Al-Zoubi and Ammar Khammash and was attended by Andrew Michael Hurley. Dr Susan Frenk, principle of St Aidan’s college, welcomed the guests and presented them with gifts. Fadia Faqir, writing fellow at St Aidan’s college and initiator and co-founder of Alta’ir, described how the exchange has blossomed and how a seed, which was planted in 2016, grew into a beautiful tree with a bird ‘Alta’ir’ perched on it. She also thanked all partners, supporters, and sponsors.

Supporters
It is important to acknowledge the help and support Alta’ir Durham-Jordan:
Creative Collaboration programme has received from the following amazing people:
On the Jordanian side:
Carol Palmer and Firas Bqa’in at the CBRL for their kind hospitality
Writer and playwright HE Haza’ Albarai, first secretary of the Ministry of Culture
Writer and playwright Mofleh Aladwan for his continual help and support of this project
Ammar Khammash for his generous support
Writer Jalal Barjas at the Jordanian Narrative Lab
Valentina Kassisieh, CEO of the Shoman Foundation, and her amazing staff
Shima Al Tal and her amazing staff
Kafa Al-Zoubi and her husband Salam Qubailat for their generous hospitality
On the British side:
St Aidan’s College, Durham University: My colleagues Dr Susan Frenk, principal; Sukanya Miles-Watson, assistant senior tutor; and Emma Wilson, college office coordinator
Rebecca Wilkie, senior programmes manager, Durham Book Festival
Claire Malcolm, CEO of New Writing North
Adam Talib, Director of Studies at the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, Durham University
Ouissal Harize, School of Modern Language and Cultures for carrying out all the translation and interpretation for the exchange.
Eman Al Assa, DPET scholar, School of Modern Language and Cultures, for helping out with instant interpretation.

Sponsors
This year’s exchange wouldn’t have been possible without the generous support of Durham Book Festival/ New Writing North, The British Institute in Amman/CBRL, St Aidan’s College, Durham University, and Mr Ammar Khammash.

Introducing Iraqi Author Ali Bader

To counter the rise of racism and xenophobia, I began thinking about a project that could be an antidote to the toxic culture of hate prevailing all over the world. A fellowship in the west for Arab authors seemed a fitting way of challenging preconceptions and creating dialogue between civilisations.

During my travels over the past two years, I spoke to academics, writers, intellectuals, journalist both Arab and non-Arab about my dream.

In 2013 I had an author’s round table and a book signing at the Fourth Annual Translation Conference, held at the Hamad bin Khalifa University, and co-sponsored by the Qatar Foundation. Iraqi author and journalist Samuel Shimon, the London-based editor and co-founder of Banipal, a renowned international magazine of contemporary Arab literature published in English, gave a keynote speech in which he said that in his experience of publishing from Arabic into English, Western publishers needed to move beyond narrow stereotypes of Arabic novels and writers. Listening to him, the idea of cooperation with Banipal began germinating.

I went back to Durham and had a meeting with Dr Susan Frenk, the principal of St Aidan’s College, Durham University, where I hold a Creative Writing Fellowship, and this distinguished scholar and amazing woman welcomed the idea.

On 27 April, 2016, at the Abu Dhabi International Bookfair, I had a meeting with Margaret Obank, trustee of Banipal Publishing, and discussed the idea with her. The outcome was positive and we agreed to hold a meeting in Durham to discuss it further.

On 26 September Dr Sudan Frenk, Margaret Obank, Samuel Shimon, and I met and we agreed to set up the Banipal Visiting Writer Fellowship (BVWF) for published authors writing in Arabic. History was made for the fellowship is the first of its kind. I have nothing but gratitude and praise for the Banipal team and St Aidan’s College.

Margaret kindly offered to conduct negotiations with the British Council. After a number of conversations and a meeting they agreed to support us.

We publicised the fellowship in November, 2016, and we received 198 applications. Some of the best Arab writers have applied. In December, in a meeting at the American University of Kuwait we chose the shortlist. Then the committee selected the Iraqi author Ali Bader as the first Fellow and he arrived in Durham on 23 January, 2017.

Truly, a dream come true.

*****

Ali Bader is a well-known Iraqi novelist and essayist, whose work is making an important contribution to contemporary Arabic literature. He is the author of thirteen works of fiction, two of which were long-listed for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (aka Arabic Booker), and several works of non-fiction.

He was born 1979 in Baghdad, where he studied Western Philosophy and French Literature. His first novel,Papa Sartre: بابا سارتر, which was published in 2001, focuses on the legacy of the 1960s generation, and criticises their negative impact on their culture. Following its critical acclaim in the Arab world, he was awarded the State Prize for Literature in Baghdad in 2002, and the Tunisian Abu Al-Qassem Al-Shabi Award, and the novel was translated into English.

In 2002, his novel The Family’s Winter: شتاء العائلة revisits the of theme of the decline of the Iraq’s elite, but this time focusing on the aristocracy during the 1950s. That same year, he received the Literary Creativity Prize.

His third novel The Road to Mutran Hill, published in 2003, focuses on Iraqi’s social problems and the increasing division between different segments, denominations, and ethnicities, and it prophesies the disintegration of Iraq.

His novel Jerusalem Lantern is a fictional rendering of the life of the late Palestinian intellectual Edward Said.

In his novel The Tobacco Keeper, which was short listed for the international prize for Arabic Fiction, he uses reportage, memoir, historical documents, etc. to constructs the life of Kamal Medhat, an Iraqi Jewish musician, whose body was found floating on the River Tigris. The novel follows his struggle to integrate into Iraqi society. The rich tapestry is layered skilfully and the distance between observer and observed is carefully orchestrated to create maximum impact. The narrative zooms in and out on the life of the composer, which mirrors the modern history of Iraq. Larger questions about identity, nationalism, and freedom both individual and otherwise are also raised.

His latest work, Crime, Art, and a Dictionary of Baghdad, is a novel about the sacramental and philosophical schools during the Abbasid era.

He is working on his new novel Liar takes All.

Ali Bader also wrote non-fiction:  Massion in Baghdad (2005), Sleeping Prince and Waiting Campaign (2006), Shahadat: Witnessing Iraq’s Transformation after 2003 (2007), and MNSG: Navigation between Home and Exile (2008), which won the Every Human Has Rights Media Award of 2008.

He is also a seasoned publisher and recently he took the reins of Alca Books. In addition, he contributes regularly to  the Arabic newspapers such as Al-Hayat, Al-Mada, Al-Dustour, and Al-Riyadh. He was also a war correspondent.

We are fortunate to have such a prolific and prominent Arab writer among us.

Reflections on my Experience as a Judge of a Literary Prize

I was delighted to accept Kuwaiti author Taleb al-Rifai’s invitation to join the judging panel of Al-Multaqa Short Story Competition 2016, sponsored by the American University in Kuwait and Al-Multaqa al-Thaqafi: Cultural Circle, found and managed by Dr al- Rifai.

Prominent Moroccan author Ahmad Al-Madini was appointed as a chair of the panel. My colleagues on the judging panel were: Egyptian author Ezzat al-Kamhawi, Iraqi writer and critic Salima Salih, and Kuwaiti writer and critic Ali Al Enazzi.

On 27 April, 2016 in Abu Dhabi the panel met in the presence of Dr Taleb al Riai, founder of the prize, to set the criteria for the selection. We agreed that on the following yardsticks: content and creativity in presenting it, language (accuracy, beauty etc.), use of imagination, impact (emotional and otherwise), and overall vision.

What made the process successful is that both the chairman and members of the judging paned observed total confidentiality, and never disclosed the procedure or discussed participants and their works with any outside parties. This resulted in a first round free of xenophobia, cliquism, preferential treatment and immune to outside influences.

As an academic and writer of fiction, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of reading one hundred and eighty-four collections of Arabic short stories and exploring the literary map of the Arab world farther.

However, the amount of simple and simplistic works that get published in the Arab world is staggering and perhaps one reasons behind that is the way the publishing industry functions and publications processed. In many cases, authors pay publishers to get published not the other way round, which eschews standards and corrupts the measures commissioning editors apply when selecting a work. Alas most works that see the light should have been left in the dark. Another symptom of the lack of professionalism in publishing is the number of language and typographical mistakes. So, the author pays to be published and the publishing house spends very little on copyediting and/or printing the text and the result is poor indeed.

Most of the collections are either reportage, autobiography, memories, or confessional writing thinly disguised as fiction. They are hurried, shallow, crude and single-layered with little dramatisation and riddled with clichés without any plot or structure. In a few cases pornography is superimposed on the text and sexual scenes are not justified within the text or the context.

The description in most collections is stilted and the characters one-dimensional and static. And in many cases, you encounter sentimentality and emotions that are not justified within the text, therefore, could not be evoked in the recipient reader, a lack of what T.S. Eliot called the ‘objective correlative.’ Most collections fail at both form and content levels, which are interconnected of course.

There is a confusion concerning literary genres for prose is not poetry and no matter how beautifully-written a paragraph is that does not turn into a short story. Some writers use the twist or the surprising ending of poetry in prose. But poetic prose does not turn a text into a short story, which is a specific literary genre with its own prerequisites. There is also some over-writing and flexing of linguistic muscles without much success.

There is a marked difference in the levels of works considered for the prize and unevenness within the collections themselves. Many authors are full of good intentions, but they rarely realise them. Many authors suffer from shortness of breath and sloppiness where the movement of the hand is not completed. A disjointed literary work can be classified as ‘trauma literature’, where there are absences, but the text is normally complete and realises its full potential. But that does not apply to some of the collections I have read. Writers, in some cases, are not distant enough from their material so the they could turn them into resonant and meaningful literary texts and many use writing as exorcism or a way to vent out anger

Luckily a few authors master the art of writing fiction and in control of their tools. They use a multitude of techniques: the interior monologue, steam of consciousness, different perspectives, unreliable narrators, mixing of registers and voices, operatic corals, intertwining between fantasy and reality, intertextuality, and mythology. Some can be classified as modernist and others as postmodernists and very few are feminist. Some texts are original, creative and the imagination of their writer soars high.

In his multi-media collection “مصحة الدمى” Doll’s Infirmity”, Moroccan author Anis Arafai challenges the boundaries between fiction, essay writing, reportage and photography and the result is a tour de force. The collection cannot be classified as a photoessay or under graphic literature for that would be a reduction. Some of the prose rises to the level of poetry. Arafai uses the second person, which readers don’t encounter very often, adding to the uniqueness of his narrative. Overall his work is original, tightly-plotted, beautifully-written with a surprising ending.

It is a no mean feat for Arab authors to produce such works under the present circumstances. Some tackled political issues, such as how corruption permeates and destroys the societal fabric of a country with grace and lightness of touch. For example, in his collection “نكات للمسلحين” Jokes for Gunmen” Palestinian writer Mazen Maarouf, who unanimously won al-Multaqa Short Story Competition 2016, writes from a child’s point of view most of the time about oppression, lack of control over surroundings and other issues. This collection, in which each story is mature and complete, reminds us of the writings of the late Emil Habibi, but Maarouf takes Habibi’s writing to another level and a touch of surrealism is added to the combination of tragedy and comedy. The unusual and bizarre is mixed with the mundane to produce texts that are deceptively simple, but raise existential questions. The brutality of the occupier is always present in the background and presented indirectly or metaphorically without any mention of the political realities against which Maarouf’s texts are set or were produced.

Very few writers succeed in transposing us to their unique world, where reality is not only presented, but also reshaped. Some create rich multi-layered texts with a unique vision, which might help readers understand the complex realities of the region. In an Arab world riddled with wars, civil and uncivil, and conflicts, to pick up the pen and write is a triumph in itself. Furthermore, to produce unique and original texts that would stand any scrutiny whether local or international is a victory for Arabic literature and culture.

Published in Banipal 58, Spring 2017

عدد الأعمال السطحيّة التي تنشر في العالم العربي مفجع

أسعدني أن أوافق على الانضمام إلى لجنة تحكيم جائزة الملتقى للقصة العربية القصيرة لعام 2016 التي تمولها الجامعة الأمريكية والملتقى الثقافي في الكويت. ولقد استمتعت بقراءة مئة وتسع وثمانين مجموعة قصصية ضمن المجموعات التي تم ترشيحها للجائزة وباكتشاف جزءٍ من الخارطة الأدبية للعالم العربي

ويمكنني أن أقول بأنّه وللأسف فإنّ عدد الأعمال السطحيّة التي تنشر في العالم العربي مفجع، ولعل  أهم سبب وراء ذلك أنه في كثير من الحالات يدفع الكاتب للناشر مقابل النشر مما أخلّ المعايير التي يطبقها المحررون لاختيار العمل والسماح له برؤية النور. وسبب آخر أيضا، هو شح الروح المهنية لدى دور النشر المتمثل في تفشي الأخطاء اللغوية والمطبعية في النصوص.  فكما هو معلوم  في بعض الدول العربية، يدفع المؤلف لدار النشر، وهي بدورها تحتفظ بمعظم المبلغ وتنفق القليل منه فقط على تحرير وطباعة وتدقيق النص

حقيقىة، يمكن تصنيف معظم المجموعات التي اطلعت عليها تحت بند السرد الصحفي أوالتقرير النثري أوالسيرة الذاتية أوالمذكرات أوالخواطر أو أدب الاعتراف، وذلك دون  أدنى استخدام للأسلوب القصصي الدرامي. وربما كتب كثير من النصوص بسرعة، ولهذا نجد أنّ معظمها ضحل وفج وأحادي الطبقة ومليء بالتعابير المستهلكة دون أي حبكة أوبنية مدروسة. وفي حالات قليلة يتم إسقاط المشاهد الجنسية دون حاجة الى ذلك أو دون توظيف حقيقي لها في النص ودلالته مما جعلها تبدو دخيلة

وقد ظهر الوصف في معظم الأعمال جامدا، واللغة ركيكة ، والشخصيات مسطّحة. وفي كثير من الحالات تم استعمال الرومانسية التي عفى عليها الزمن، حيث نجد فيضا من العواطف والمشاعر غير المبررة في النص، وبالتالي؛ لا تستحضر في القارئ المتلقي أي ردود فعل نفسية لعدم وجود ما سماه إليوت بالمعادل الموضوعي*. وهكذا فشلت مجموعات كثيرة على مستويي الشكل والمضمون. وتجدر الإشارة إلى أن هنالك التباس بشأن الأنواع الأدبية، فالنثر ليس شعرا ومهما كانت الفقرة مكتوبة بشكل جميل فإنّ هذا لا يحولها إلى قصة قصيرة. ومن الملحوظ أيضا وجود حالة مفارقة شعرية إدهاشية في نهاية كثير من النصوص، وبالرغم من ذلك تبقى نثرا أو نثرا شعريا ولا تنطبق عليها معايير القصة القصيرة. وبعض الكتاب قد “أفرط في الكتابة*”  محاولا استعراض العضلات اللغوية بلا طائل، حيث بقي النص ضحلا

وهنالك تفاوت كبير في مستويات الأعمال المرشحة للجائزة وضمن المجموعات نفسها. ولا تكفي أن تكون نية الكاتب حسنة ليتحقق نجاح العمل الأدبي

وكثير من الكتاب هم من ذوي النفس القصير حيث لم يستطيعوا إتمام إبراز جمال القصة. ومن الأعمال ماهو مفكك، ولكن لا يمكن أن نصنفه تحت بند أدب الصدمة*، الذي يتميز بوجود فجوات في السرد  القصصي، مع اكتمال العمل وتحقيقه لأهدافه. وكان جليا أنه في كثير من النصوص تم إستعمال الكتابة للتنفيس عن الضغط النفسي وتطهير الذات

ولحسن الحظ هنالك قلة من الكتاب المرشحين للجائزة بدو متمكنين من تقنيات الكتابة القصصية وأدواتها، اذ استخدموا المونولوج الداخلي والأبعاد المتعددة والرواة غير الموثوق بهم وتيار الوعي وخلط اللهجات الاجتماعية والأصوات المتعددة، والتحول اللغوي والمزج بين الواقع والفانتازيا، واستخدام التناص والموروث الثقافي والأساطير. ويمكن تصنيف بعض النصوص بأنها حداثية أو ما بعد الحداثة، والقلة القليلة منها نسوية. وهنالك نصوص أصيلة وخلاقة يحلق فيها خيال الكاتب عاليا

وعند القليل من الكتاب، كما في حالة أنيس الرافعي، كان المزج بين الاجناس المختلفة كالقصة القصيرة، والسرد الصحفي، والتصوير الفوتوغرافي خلاقا. والنص هنا أصيل والبناء محكم والحبكة متينة ولغة النص شعرية أحيانا والنهاية مفاجئة. الخطوج الروائية تمزج بمهارة فائقة ويتم جمعها ببراعة. وقد استخدم الكاتب ضمير المخاطب وهذا ما لا نراه في كثيرا من النصوص القصصية

ومما يدعو للتفاؤل أن الكتاب استطاعوا إنتاج مثل بعض هذه الأعمال في ظل الظروف الحالية الصعبة التي يمر بها العالم العربي. حيث عالج بعضهم القضايا السياسية ببراعة؛ مثل كيفية تسرب الفساد ببطء إلى أن يتدمر النسيج الاجتماعي. وعلى سبيل المثال هنا، مجموعة الكاتب الفلسطيني مازن معروف “نكات للمسلحين” التي فازت بالجائزة بالإجماع. كتبت  هذه المجموعة على خلفية الاحتلال الإسرائيلي لفلسطين وهوما يتناوله الكاتب في بعض القصص فعليا وبعضها الآخر مجازيا. وذكرتني بكتابات الكاتب الفلسطيني الراحل إيميل حبيبي إلا أن معروف تميز عن حبيبي بقدرته على خلق عالم سوريالي يتوازن فيه ويتساوى الخوف والمرح والسخرية والكابوسية. ويتعامل معروف مع هذا الموضوع الجاد بسخرية وفكاهة أحيانا لينتج نصا مضحكا ومبكيا في آن واحد . وقد نجح في تعرية وحشية ودموية المحتل بسلاسة وخفة في هذه المجموعة دون أي ذكر للأحداث السياسية التي اسهمت في إنتاج هذه النصوص

ويمكن القول أن القلة القليلة من الكتاب قد نجحت في نقلنا إلى عالمهم الغرائبي الخاص وقدمت لنا قصصا قصيرة فريدة لا تصور الواقع فقط بل تعيد تشكيله. وخلق البعض نصوصا غنية متعددة الدلالات ذات رؤية خاصة قد تساعدنا على فهم حاضرنا واستشراف مستقبلنا، وهذا يشكل انتصارا لنا وللغتنا وأدبنا بالرغم من كل التحديات

 

 

 

“*objective correlative”

“*Over-writing”

“*Trauma Literature

Lost in Translation: The Arab Book in the Language of the Other

The Arab book is a beleaguered creature,undernourished, undervalued and deprived of the very oxygen that makes it grow and prosper: freedom of expression. In the 22 countries of the Arab world with a combined population of 284 million, a ‘best seller’ may have a print run of just 5,000 copies, as a result of censorship, high illiteracy rates  – about 60 million adults in the Arab world today cannot read or write – and other constraints. Arabs constitute 5 per cent of the world’s population, yet they produce only 1 per cent of the world’s books, 17 per cent of which are religious books. In 1996, Arab countries produced no more than 1,945 literary and artistic books. Translation of foreign works into Arabic lag far behind figures in the rest of the world: according to the UN, ‘five times more books are translated into Greek, a language spoken by just 11 million people, than into Arabic’.

Security services ban, burn or confiscate publications if they perceive them to violate political, moral and/or religious sensitivities. They also prevent the sale of certain books and promote the sale of others. There are 22 departments of censorship at the ministries of culture across the Arab world. Further, it is difficult for books to move easily through Arab borders to their natural markets, which ultimately increases the cost of production and hinders publishing and circulation. Creativity, innovation and knowledge are thus curtailed.

As a result of the economic sanctions against Libya, for example, you cannot buy any book that resembles anything scholarly. Colonel Gaddafi’s The Green Book, however, was on sale everywhere, together with the published proceedings of a conference on The Green Book. Libyan writers have no option but to add their manuscript to the long queue at the Al-Dar al-Jamahiriyya li al-Nashr wa al-Tawzi, a government-sponsored publishing house. They normally wait for long periods, sometimes up to 10 years or more, to get published. Most hapless authors do not dare take their manuscripts out of the queue for lack of other options and for fear of being put back at the end of the queue if they later change their minds.

Jordanian authors submit their manuscripts to the erratic and whimsical censor, who sometimes sends them back with red marks all over and with nuggets of advice such as: ‘kill the main character’. Many authors save up to pay publishers the printing costs of their novels. It is the reverse of what normally happens: while publishers pay to buy copyrights here in the UK, authors in Jordan pay to sell their work to the fat-cat publishers.

There is also the matter of self-appointed censors who initiate witch hunts against authors; the recent court case against Nawal el-Sadaawi. Samia Mehrez, professor of Modern Arabic Literature at the American University in Cairo, for example, came under attack for assigning to her class the fictional autobiography of the Moroccan writer Muhammad Choukri, al-Khubz al-Hafi, which was perceived by some students and parents to be ‘pornographic’.

Without any valid travel documents or a visa the Arab book travels West.

The picture is equally grim on the other side of the divide. The Arab world translates about 330 books per year. In 1999, the USA, with a population of 285 million and a publishing industry that produces well over 100,000 books per year, translated 330 fiction and poetry titles. This contributes to the ‘provincialisation’ of Arab and US minds. In the UK, the Arts Council’s budget for translating from all the languages of the world into English is £92,000 (US$156,400); Arabic receives very little of this.

There is also growing suspicion of those who can speak other languages, particularly Arabic. A few years ago, Francis Fukuyama said, ‘The State Department was well rid of its Arabists and Arabic speakers because by learning that language they also learned the ‘delusions’ of the Arabs.’ Primo Levi argued that some people perceive a person who can speak another language as ‘an outsider, a foreigner, strange, and therefore, a potential enemy’.

Since the mid-nineteenth century, some have argued that the Arabic language and the Arabs are afflicted with both a mentality and a language that has no use for reality. In 1988, Edward Said tried to interest a New York publisher in the works of Naguib Mahfouz, ‘but after a little reflection the idea was turned down. When I inquired why, I was told (with no detectable irony) that Arabic was a controversial language’. Even after Mahfouz won the Nobel Prize, his publishers felt it necessary to flag that he had been influenced by Flaubert, Balzac, Proust to make him palatable.

Using a West European yardstick, Arabic, an ‘indirect, oral language’, is normally compared to its disadvantage with English, a ‘literate, direct language’. According to one commentator, ‘Arabic lacks logic in the Western popular sense . . . it encourages an emotional appeal, emphasises structure and form, depends on association as a persuasive device, and relies on a generally indirect approach.’ Language is never dysfunctional, it is a tool that merely reflects the development or underdevelopment of the intellect of its user.

The Arab Women Writers series, for example, was a project fraught with difficulties.  The poor distribution of Arab books made them almost impossible to find in the bookshops of Western capitals. After spending almost a year chasing up books, consulting colleagues, publishers and booksellers, five novels by Arab women, who normally get little publicity in the West, were commissioned. The novels were deliberately chosen as an antidote to some of the inferior texts that get translated into English and that normally confirm many of the preconceptions some editors and readers have about the oppressive and illogical Arab. x

The long debate with the publishers began to convince them that a text written originally in Arabic rather than in English does not automatically mean it is inferior. What complicates matters is the small number of editors in Western publishing houses who master Arabic; even some of those of Arab origin are unable to read and understand modern standard Arabic. As for those who studied Arabic at university, many have difficulties reading long Arabic texts to select some for translation. Most editors are also ignorant of the Arab-Islamic culture and must be educated to be able to appreciate and contextualise the books.

Although Arabic ranks sixth in the world league table of languages, with an estimated 284 million native speakers, fewer and fewer people have an acceptable knowledge of it. Arabic generally can be divided into Classical Arabic – our Latin – that is read and written by a small minority; Modern Standard Arabic – an adapted and simplified version of Classical Arabic – and a large number of local dialects. ‘Written, literary Arabic with its grammatical complexities is notoriously difficult to learn. Arabic readers need to master an ancient and intricate blueprint of foreign grammar, syntax and vocabulary.’ This might partly explain the uphill struggle to find qualified and properly trained translators to work with on the Arab Women Writers Series (Garnet Publishing). The quality of the translations, with few exceptions, was poor indeed. Translators, with degrees in translation from reputable universities, did not know the difference between daraj and durj, for example. Not only does the quality of their education leave much to be desired, some Arabic departments are now under threat of closure.

Many Arabs living in the West have decided to cut out the middleman and create ‘an Arab book’ in the language of the other. The reasons behind this decision vary, but it is a by-product of the colonial encounter and, as Salah Trabelsi says, of a rising awareness of ‘multiculturalism that provisionally disowns one’s self to listen to and to perceive, beyond differences, a kinship of gestures and of desire.’ The writing of some Arabs in the West treads the divide between two cultures and, as result, suffers and benefits from occupying such a dangerous site, linguistically and otherwise. ‘Displacement urges transcultural writers to revisit their culture of origin by the essential questioning of their relationships with their body, faiths, rites, languages’ (Trabelsi 2003)

I find it puzzling that the large body of writing in English by Arabs or authors of Arab origin has not yet been subjected to serious study and analysis. Geoffery Nash’s book The Arab Writer in English: Arab Themes in a Metropolitan Language, 1908-1958 is the first serious study of what he describes as the ‘internationalisation of literature’ and its impact on Arab writers. Let me fill this gap and coin a new term: ‘Arabs writing in English’ (AWE). This covers the body of work by Arab writers who write in the English language and whose mother tongue is usually Arabic. It is also associated with the works of members of the Arab diaspora, especially people such as Ahdaf Soueif, who was born in Egypt. As a category, this comes under the broader realm of postcolonial literature, produced in previously colonised countries such as Egypt, Lebanon, Sudan and Jordan.

AWE is transcultural writing that problematises social issues, sense of identity and terms of reference. ‘The production of a new discourse defies the constraints and taboos of the culture of origin (such as the sacredness of the Arabic language or the subaltern status of women) by putting it in dialogue with a different culture. The purpose is neither soft-edged amalgamation nor slavish mimicry; instead, it is to propose creative new identities for the individual and the collective subject.’ (Trabelsi 2003)

As an Arab writer, writing about the Arab culture in English, I find myself preoccupied with themes of exile and representation that reflect the condition of an ‘expatriarch’, a writer who has crossed from one culture into another because of her father. This trans-cultural position is reflected in the intricate process through which my writing is composed and through my endless attempts to carve a small territory within the English language for myself. Behind the all-embracing problems of creative duplicity, from a post-colonial position emerges one writer’s struggle to comprehend an alien world and cope with the profound consequences of living a bicultural identity.

When I interviewed her for the East Anglia University magazine in 1988 Toni Morrison said, ‘literature is about to change and it is going to be changed by earnest minorities, that is where the life is, fait accompli. So, your job, my job and the job of women and people of colour is to make sure that they do justice to what is about to come.’ This argument can be extended to include earnest majorities in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Post 9/11 and 7/7 translation and dialogue are no longer optional. By definition civilisations never clash, they borrow, converse and learn from each other. In this transnational space with no safe corners the most exciting and necessary literature is born. The site is dangerous, tiring, and stimulating, but there is no other space I rather be. There is no other space that you, I hope, rather be. Your mind cannot pass sound judgements on momentous events without listening to the voice of the other, which is in these dangerous times is no longer a luxury. Literature will bring us closer, will help us forgive, will even console us. To you on all sides of the divide I say today, ‘translate, publish, read and learn or be damned.’

London Book Fair, 7/3/2006

References
The Arab Human Development Report 2003 (AHDR 2003), UNDP
Benhaddou, Mohamed, ‘Postcolonial Textualization of Arabic’, Political Discurse – Theories of Colonialism and Postcolonialism, May, 2003.
Devlin, Kieron, Mississippi Review.com, 2002.
URL: http://www.mississippireview.com/2002/leilani-devlin
Dilday, K. A., ‘Lost in Translation: The narrowing of the American Mind’, OpenDemocracy, May, 2003.
Castillo, Daniel Del, ‘The Arabic Publishing Scene is a Desert, Critics Say’, August 10, 2001.
http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/arabpu.htm
Said, Edward, ‘Dreams and Delusions’, Al-Ahram Weekly, 20-27 August, 2003.
Said, Edward, ‘Naguib Mahfouz and the Cruelty of Memory’, Counterpunch, December, 2001.
Trebelsi, Hechmi, ‘Transcultural Writing: Ahdaf Soueif’s Aisha’, Jouvert, Issue 2, Vol. 7, 2003.