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Abdelrahman Munif Abdelrahman Munif is one of the Arab world's most popular and distinguished novelists. He takes up the theme of oppression to combat real oppression. He tailors his particular combination of history and moral purpose to the common Arab, inciting him to resist oppressive political authorities and to forge a new history of his ov·m making. ln an Arab world in which democracy is largely unknown, it is no surprise that a novelist like Munif adopted 'oppression' as a constant, essential theme for his novels and his life. Munif chronicles the Arabs' every-day issues and concerns as if he were a historian of Arab life, writing from the viewpoint of the oppressed. After writing about the Arab man's sense of siege and alienation in Al-Ashjar wa Ightiyal Marzouq Faisal Oarraj Munif and the novel of resistance (Trees and the A_sassination of Mar:011q), unif returned to the subject of oppression in a novel with a revealing title, lrarq al-Mutawassit (East of tlze 1editerranean). Ea t of the 1editerranean there are no differences between life inside or outide of prisons. 'Prison' in its usual sense is only a pecial instance of the wider prison lunif details, the prison of daily life in Arab society. East of the Mediterranean doe not refer to any particular Arab gm·ernment. Rather, it refers to all Arab ovemments as interconnected prisons. More than ten years later, the persistence of oppression pro oked 1unif to return to his theme in a new novel whose very title, Al-Aan, Hunn, mt Slwrq al-Mutawassit Marra Ukl1ra (Naw and Here, or East of the Mediterranean Once Again), harks back to the other work. Begimling as a political activist with dreams of the rise of Arab nationalism, Munif saw that oppression was a major cause of the Arab defeat in June 1967 While some see the defeat as only one episode of many in the Arab-Zionist conflict, Munif's generation has understood it as the Arab's greatest defeat of the twentieth century, the most dangerous defeat since that of Mohammed Ali in the nineteenth century A full-time writer The defeat was not considered Israel' victory so much as a victory for all Arab political powers opposed to modernity and enlightenment. The burden of tllis defeat brought Munif to end his political career and become a full-time writer. Accordingly, his novel serves two functions: it is, firstly, a tool for contemplating the causes that ~ positive in general, for there is a lot of Arabic literature that deserves to be known by the others. ln tllis way they can judge its merits and understand the nature of the area, its people, their preoccupations and their dreams. Literature can be a true mirror that reflects their lives, ideas and aspirations. But, because translation, most often, follows other considerations besides the artistic merits of what is being translated, we find that certain elements of taste and fashion, in addition to personal contacts, play a part in the choosing of particular works for translation and the neglect of others. This, of necessity, makes the mirror reflect something else besides reality and calls for careful exarnina- tion of the true qualities of what is going to be chosen to be translated. This is a collective responsibility of the translators and those who select the material to be translated. Such a situation demands careful scrutiny, otherwise both sides could lose out, condemning Arabic literature to be locked up in Orientalist circles, read exclusively by students of Arabic language in Western universities, and not by the reading audiences at large. Challenge and tragedy The novel that I'm working on now, Ardh al-Sawad [77ie Land of Plenty], deals with one of the most decisive periods in the history of Iraq, where nature and internal problems breed challenge and tragedy - in addition to territorial wars. But the strength inherent in the people and the land is able to create life again. Iraq has been a reservoir of sadness across the ages and Iraqi singing is only one of the marlifestations of that sadness. It is no accident that the flood of which many ancient histories tell occurred in Iraq, and that the Battle of Karbala, which happened a long time ago, is still going on! Ardh al-Sawad is a journey through a specific epoch that traverses tllis expanse of pain and tragedy in order to comprehend its source, and how it accumulates and expands from one generation to the next. 14 :W, ~H "" ... October 1998
page 17
pushed Arab society to defeat; and secondly, it is a provocative tool, questioning the hierarchies behind these causes. The pairing of oppression and resistance, central to Muni£' s novels Trees and the Assassination of Marzouq and East of the Mediterranean, recurs in Aalam Bila Khara'et (A World Without Maps), authored jointly with Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, and in which Muni£ explores the 1967 defeat in a lengthy monologue. Oppression provokes the Arab man and incites him to stand and resist, enabling him to shape his life in a manner that preserves human dignity It can be said that all of Munif' s works concentrate on the duality of the Arab man: the normality of injury He considers the thesis that injury stems from oppressive political authority, and that normality comes to mean resistance to this very authority Political authority is omnipresent in Muni£' s work. Oppressive daily life Muni£' s novels are set in oppressive daily life, and Muni£ has therefore written on the effects of Arab oil. It is said that Muni£' s interest in the oil issue comes from his training as a petroleum engineer. However, an examination of Arab life after the 1967 defeat reveals that 'oil wealth' has been a major factor in reshaping Arab societies, both inside and outside tl1e oil world. Although from the outside oil appeared to be a source of wealth, it actually impoverished the Arab, hijacking his destiny Oil has given rise to numerous societal phenomena including 'tl1e oil press', 'modem-day oil life', and 'oil Islam' Munif depicted the oil issue and its connections to the European powers in competition for oil in his novel Sibaq at-Masaafaat al-Taweelah (Race for the Long Distances). In his great work, Cities of Salt, Muni£ returned to the 'history of the Arab oil' and took up many other topics, among them 'the defeat of the average Arab' by western technology Munif's focus on the daily issues of Arabs was a major factor in the popularity of his works. Another factor which has strengthened his position as a distinguished Arab writer is his ability to address himself to the Arab reader in any milieu. Muni£ unifies all Arab localities in one metaphoric place. In his novel East of the Mediterranean, he points to more than one place without mentioning a single location. His Cities of Salt mirrors many Arab cities. Literary strategy In addition to the metaphorical realm, Munif has also written about specific places such as Beirut and Amman, described in Sirat Madinah (Story of a City). He profiles specific personalities too, including the Moroccan journalist Urwat al-Zaman al-BalU, the Syrian painter Marwan Qassab Baashi, and the Palestinian caricaturist Naji al-Ali. Munif's literary strategy, connected both to language and literary form, reaches the general reader successfuJJy Muni£ has written in a language particular to him, designating it 'the middle language' This language, neither falling into colloquialism nor simplification, is known nevertheless to the general reader. While some Arab novelists alienate readers with elitist language or adaptions of semantically formal, dictionary language, Munif has stayed away from both the language of the dictionary and the dead language of the academy He has produced prose equipped to handle material life. His language declares reader-writer equality; the writer is the founder of democracy This democracy is not determined by the writer's subject or his position thereon, but by his acceptance of the people's language. Muni£' s distance from the linguistic hierarchy establishes a distance from the social hierarchy and the political authority it reflects. Munif' s novels seek to rewrite history from the vantage point of a people devoid of historians, the overwhelming majority of Arab peoples. Perhaps his closeness to this marginalised majority drove him to literary forms evident in popular literature. Senior academicians and dogmatic religious authorities silence popular literature. They decry its lack of respect for traditional rules and moral tenets. In contrast, in al-Nihayaat (Endings), Munif relies on a storyteller, a popular figure rooted in traditional Arab culture. Furthermore, Muni£ builds Cities of Salt on sequential popular tales, replacing a forged 'official' history with tales told by the simple people. A further reason for Muni£' s popularity is his credibility Practicality serves as Munif's compass: where writing calls for a more humane, more beautiful, more moral world, Muni£ creates a moral and aesthetic alternative which he swnmons as a comprehensive guide for his daily practices. Through his extended exile in Cairo, Amman, Baghdad, Beirut, Damascus and Paris, Muni£ has demonstrated his credibility· Muni£ flew from place to place as if escaping from one cage to another -or as if he could only find freedom in the moments separating these cages. Paralleling his hatred of cages and his calls for a free world is Munif's disdain for esoteric writing - for any writing that does not leave life's windows open. In the end, he introduces himself not as a novelist, but as an intellectual who writes as he lives. Muni£ simultaneously establishes dialogue with the ordinary man and observes the ordinary man's life of defeats, as the Arab world sinks alongside him into a continuous sense of defeat. Muni£' s novels highlight the tension of oppression and resistance. His no els contemplate history and revise it from the point of view of the oppressed masses, with an eye to transforming the course of history Marrying history to ethics An autobiographical account of a collective identity in jeopardy, Munif' s work answers the local powers that subsume Arab history into the history of their interests. He also answers the West, which subsumes human history into the history of its victorious technology In this sense, Munif' s novels are novels of resistance even as they call for resistance, marrying history to ethics. Overall, Muni£ contemplates the objective lessons of history in order to awaken human will, ever dreaming of a new, collective will capable of forming a new, humane history for the Arabs. Darraj's article translated by Bassam Frangieh and Laurie Adlerstein !g\~"'J:'.?', :1.., October 1998 15

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Abdelrahman Munif

Abdelrahman Munif is one of the Arab world's most popular and distinguished novelists. He takes up the theme of oppression to combat real oppression. He tailors his particular combination of history and moral purpose to the common Arab, inciting him to resist oppressive political authorities and to forge a new history of his ov·m making.

ln an Arab world in which democracy is largely unknown, it is no surprise that a novelist like Munif adopted 'oppression' as a constant, essential theme for his novels and his life. Munif chronicles the Arabs' every-day issues and concerns as if he were a historian of Arab life, writing from the viewpoint of the oppressed.

After writing about the Arab man's sense of siege and alienation in Al-Ashjar wa Ightiyal Marzouq

Faisal Oarraj

Munif and the novel of resistance

(Trees and the A_sassination of Mar:011q), unif returned to the subject of oppression in a novel with a revealing title, lrarq al-Mutawassit (East of tlze 1editerranean). Ea t of the 1editerranean there are no differences between life inside or outide of prisons. 'Prison' in its usual sense is only a pecial instance of the wider prison lunif details, the prison of daily life in Arab society. East of the Mediterranean doe not refer to any particular Arab gm·ernment. Rather, it refers to all Arab ovemments as interconnected prisons. More than ten years later, the persistence of oppression pro oked 1unif to return to his theme in a new novel whose very title, Al-Aan, Hunn, mt Slwrq al-Mutawassit Marra Ukl1ra (Naw and Here, or East of the Mediterranean Once Again), harks back to the other work.

Begimling as a political activist with dreams of the rise of Arab nationalism, Munif saw that oppression was a major cause of the Arab defeat in June 1967 While some see the defeat as only one episode of many in the Arab-Zionist conflict, Munif's generation has understood it as the Arab's greatest defeat of the twentieth century, the most dangerous defeat since that of Mohammed Ali in the nineteenth century

A full-time writer

The defeat was not considered Israel' victory so much as a victory for all Arab political powers opposed to modernity and enlightenment. The burden of tllis defeat brought Munif to end his political career and become a full-time writer. Accordingly, his novel serves two functions: it is, firstly, a tool for contemplating the causes that ~

positive in general, for there is a lot of Arabic literature that deserves to be known by the others. ln tllis way they can judge its merits and understand the nature of the area, its people, their preoccupations and their dreams. Literature can be a true mirror that reflects their lives, ideas and aspirations.

But, because translation, most often, follows other considerations besides the artistic merits of what is being translated, we find that certain elements of taste and fashion, in addition to personal contacts, play a part in the choosing of particular works for translation and the neglect of others.

This, of necessity, makes the mirror reflect something else besides reality and calls for careful exarnina-

tion of the true qualities of what is going to be chosen to be translated. This is a collective responsibility of the translators and those who select the material to be translated. Such a situation demands careful scrutiny, otherwise both sides could lose out, condemning Arabic literature to be locked up in Orientalist circles, read exclusively by students of Arabic language in Western universities, and not by the reading audiences at large.

Challenge and tragedy

The novel that I'm working on now, Ardh al-Sawad [77ie Land of Plenty], deals with one of the most decisive periods in the history of Iraq, where nature and internal problems breed challenge and tragedy - in addition to territorial wars. But the strength inherent in the people and the land is able to create life again. Iraq has been a reservoir of sadness across the ages and Iraqi singing is only one of the marlifestations of that sadness. It is no accident that the flood of which many ancient histories tell occurred in Iraq, and that the Battle of Karbala, which happened a long time ago, is still going on!

Ardh al-Sawad is a journey through a specific epoch that traverses tllis expanse of pain and tragedy in order to comprehend its source, and how it accumulates and expands from one generation to the next.

14 :W, ~H "" ... October 1998

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