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Transcript of MA Literary Project 2008
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Narrating the Empire: Nationalism, Memory and Gender in
Arab Postcolonial Novel, the Case of Tayyib SallehsSeason of
Migration to the North, Mohammed Berradas The Game of
Forgettingand Assia DjebarsLAmour, la Fantasia
Abdelghani El KhairatLiterary Studies
Utrecht University
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Paulo De Medeiros
Second Reader: Prof. Dr. Ann Rigney
February 2008
MA Thesis
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CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENT...................................................................................................2
I. INTRODUCTION.........................................................................................................3
II. NARRATIVE WRITING IN CONTEMPORARY ARABIC LITERATURE.......7
III. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EUROPE AND THE ARAB WORLD IN
TAYYIB SALLEHS ......................................................................................................28
IV. THE MYTH OF NATIONALISM AND THE PRODUCTION OF CULTURAL
MEMORY IN MOHAMMED BRRADAS THE GAME OF FORGETTING ........49
V. THE SUBALTERN WRITES BACK IN ASSIA DJEBARS LAMOUR, LA
FANTASIA ......................................................................................................................70
VI. CONCLUSION..........................................................................................................94
WORKS CITED...............................................................................................................99
Acknowledgment
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all the people who assisted me in the
writing of this thesis and above all to Prof. Dr. Paulo De Medeiros for his valuable
advises and his constructive criticism during the different stages of writing this work.
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My special thanks go to Prof. Dr. Ann Rigney for her help, coaching and encouragement
during the last two years. I would like also to thank her for accepting to read and
comment on this thesis.
Once again, my sincere thanks go to Loes Vleeming for being passionate, supportive and
generous with me these years
Last but not least, I would like to dedicate this humble work to El Khairats and Zahers
family, especially to Latifa El Khairat and Abdelilah Zaher.
Thank you all.
I. Introduction
The decline of colonial empires after Second World War led to the rise of several
sovereign states in the Arab world and elsewhere. Most of these independent states have
been greatly influenced by imperialism and colonialism. Consequently, the need to
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achieve a functional reality was very demanding as was the need for re-creating national
identity, which had been partially or completely damaged, corrupted and marginalised. In
this context, a new mode of writing emerges as an autonomous literature that foregrounds
cultural conflicts and puts into question the relationship between the centre and the
periphery. This suggests that Arab literature produced after the colonial era significantly
and consciously questions and challenges Western cultural patterns of knowledge, which
played a crucial role in fixing the relationship between Europe and the Arab world; a
relationship based on naturalising the superiority and purity of Western civilisation and
the inferiority and corruption of Eastern one.
Re-considering the relationship between Europe and the rest of the world is one of
the dominating features in the three novels that I have chosen to analyse in this study:
Season of Migration to the Northby Sudans most famous author,Tayyib Salleh; The
Game of Forgetting, a novel written by the Moroccan critic and novelist Mohammed
Berrada; andLAmour La Fantasia, an outstanding narrative by the Algerian activist and
filmmaker Assia Djebar. In this thesis, I will discuss the relationship between Europe and
the Arab world, focusing more particularly on the genre of the novel as a form of writing
back to the centre and resisting the supremacy of European patterns of knowledge. I will
also try to show that the three novels problematisation of European colonial history
serves many purposes, some of which are to establish a dialogue with, and react against,
European models. In this respect, four issues will be highlighted, namely (a) Narrative
Writing in Contemporary Arabic Literature, (b) The Relationship between Europe and the
Arab World, (c) The Myth of Nationalism and the Production of Cultural Memory, (d)
The Subaltern Writes Back.
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The division of this thesis into four aspects dictates different ways of analysis. In
the first one, Narrative Writing in Contemporary Arabic Literature, I will try to shed
light on the current debate about the Arabic novel, in an attempt to point out the major
aspects of its development. To do so, it becomes necessary to talk about the beginnings,
and to trace out the influences of European literary models, especially the English and the
French.
As for The Relationship between Europe and the Arab World I will focus on
the East/West problematic in Tayyib Sallehs novel Seasonof Migration to the North. In
this novel, Salleh advances a dialectical relationship between European models and the
re-created independent local identity. Sallehs intellectual project starts from the
assumption that Western imperialism and colonialism are behind West/East tension. He
starts producing a counter narrative in which he reconsiders British colonial hegemony
and homogeneity. He recasts the history of the relationship between the coloniser and the
colonised, by problematising the key concepts that govern the relationship between
Europe and the Sudan.
In the Myths of Nationalism and the Production Cultural Memory, I will discuss
the use of literature in the production of cultural memory, focusing particularly on
Mohammed Berradas novel The Game of Forgetting.I will also try to provide an answer
to the question of how literature functions in relation to cultural memory; that is to say,
how the novel, as a work of art, can bear witness to the nations past and present and
contribute in establishing a cultural memory. I will show that the liaison between
literature and cultural memory is best manifested in The Game of Forgettingsince it
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manages to question, negotiate and reconstruct the past within the contemporary frame of
present-day Morocco.
The fourth and the last chapter entitled The Subaltern Writes Back deals with
Assia Djebars novelLAmour, la Fantasia. I will explain that Djebars choice to rework
the colonial history of Algeria aims at exploiting the tension between the centre and the
margin, by challenging the primacy of Western standards that assume universality. I will
examine how Algerian women have been affected, subjugated and influenced by Arab
patriarchal culture which denied them the possibility to have access to the institutions in
which power is exercised and transmitted, thereby reducing them to mere consumers, if
not subject to various forms of male oriented systems of manipulation. Furthermore, the
very act of challenging patriarchal and colonial monolithic discourse is part of Djebars
strategy of undermining the existing oppressive systems, which forced Algerian women
to fulfil the role of the subaltern, silenced and helpless victim.
To approach this topic from an effective analytical point of view, a theoretical
framework is needed. The suitable approach to analysethe theme of re-writing colonial
history is the discursive technique as proposed by postcolonial critics, who suggest that
colonial history is full of interruptions, lies and inadequacies. It is seen as a condensation
of narratives used by colonial authorities as a way to legitimise the exploitation,
subjugation and colonisation of other nations. Colonial historiography, in this sense, does
not only stand at the base of colonialism and imperialism, but also helps in manufacturing
and controlling the colonial others. The concept of cultural memory as developed by Jan
and Aleida Assmann, Ann Rigney and others will also be of great help to my analysis and
discussion since it helps us to understand how memory functions, so as to reconsider
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standardised history and propose other versions of the past missed from or dropped of
official historical records. In this context, memory opens up new perspectives in dealing
with the past; perspectives which can be defined in opposition to hegemonic views of
the past and associated with groups who have been left out, as it were, of mainstream
history (Rigney, Plenitude 13). I will also rely on some insights from Feminist Theory in
order to illustrate how Arab women, like any marginalised group, were and are still
affected and manipulated by the dominant patriarchal culture. I will use feminist
theoretical framework to uncover the system of thoughts that guarantee the supremacy of
patriarchy and the subordination of the female, especially the Arab.
II. Narrative Writing in Contemporary Arabic Literature
No discussion can be had about the emergence of modern Arabic novel without
considering the context of influence, opposition and interaction between Arab and
Western cultures. Since the end of the nineteenth-century, considered by many Arab
literary historians as the beginning of Arab cultural renaissance, Nahda, the Arab world
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knew exceptional literary enlightenments. Most of the writers of this period, mainly those
who wrote from the centre; Egypt, Syria and Lebanon, tried to catch up with the modern
world, by looking up to Western achievements in different fields of knowledge. Western
ideas and ideals, such as the French Revolution, democratic reforms, scientific findings,
played a crucial role in the 19th century intellectual awakening of Arabs. Wail Hassan
demonstrates that
It was not simply Arab intellectuals fascination with modern European
civilisation but also, and more urgently, its colonial threat that led to the
movement known asNahda (or revival) in the mid-nineteenth century. In the
wake of the short-lived French occupation of Egypt, Muhammed Alis first aim
was to build a modern army, and therefore the purpose of the educational missions
he began sending to France in the late 1820s was to borrow European science and
technology. Those missions eventually exposed Arab intellectuals to European
culture, thought, and literature. (57)
In the field of literature, for instance, new forms of expression took place. Poetry
became no longer synonymous with describing chivalric values, weeping the beloved or
praising the tribe, themes which had characterised Arabic poetry, but assumed new roles
where the interest lied on social and political issues. Alongside this thematic innovation,
a formal revolution took place in which traditional structures are replaced by Western
ones and archaic expressions by modern poetic diction. In this period of great inter-
cultural influence, the Arab literary scene witnessed the emergence of the genre of the
novel which was an unprecedented literary form with no roots in Arabic literary heritage,
unlike poetry which had a long and rich repertoire. Western narrative prose was
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welcomed in Arab literary circles because of its ability to capture and represent the daily
life within a complex network of relationships. Aspects of the novel, such as dialogism,
polyphony and irony, made it the literary genre which succeeded in representing the
reality of Arab societies and the life of its citizens more than any other existing form of
expression.
In this chapter I will try to give a general view about narrative writing in the Arab
world and how it manages to enrich political and cultural debates during a century. It is
no coincidence, then, that I have decided to divide this chapter into two major points, in
which the first one will be devoted to the rise of the novel and the second to current
issues. In the first part, I will provide a short history of the Arabic novel, by giving an
overview of the major stages and developments it underwent. I will also try to point out
the essential cultural and historical components that played a part in the implantation of
the genre of the novel in Arabs literary soil. Central to this section, will be the discussion
of Eastern examples, mainly those from Egypt and Lebanon. In the second part, I will
discuss the North African novel of both Arabic and French expression, particularly from
Morocco and Algeria. This choice is not contingent upon personal motives, the fact of my
being Moroccan, but by rather the hope to give a broaden view about Arabs literary
scene both from its centre and its margin, and also to show that other narrative writings
produced in the margin were (and still are) as important and worth of studying as those
from the centre. Narrative experience in these countries can also be seen as prototypical
of the rest of Arab nations whose literature is not considered part of the Arab canon. A
special focus is given to the issue of the choice of language for writing. In the case of this
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study, I limit my discussion about the Moroccan novel to texts written in Arabic and in
French in the case of Algeria.
The deep transformation of Arab societies during the 19th century posed
immediate challenges and causes urgent changes in all aspects of life from culture to
politics and from economics to education. Early narrative experiences have been greatly
influenced and oriented by Western models, thoughts and ideologies. Like their Western
masters, Arab writers tried to uncover the silence surrounding social conditions of the
individual and the community. Marxist and Existentialist ideologies fuelled the
revolutionary spirit of early Arabic novels during the 40s and the 50s:
After 1948, however, this trend gained a powerful momentum, which coincided
with the appearance in Arabic of the Existentialists. When Sartre and Camus (the
latter actually refused to be called Existentialist) were translated and studied all
through the fifties, they took Arab intellectual life by storm. Sartre was the special
favourite of Beiruts literary workshop, and the reaction in Baghdad and Cairo
was tremendous. One did not have to agree with everything Sartre said, but his
ideas became pivotal to the new generation of writers who sought involvement in
the political and social issues of their times. (Jabra 87-88)
In the 60s, however, the Arabic novel took another dimension due to many historical,
social and political factors, such as the emergence of totalitarian regimes in most of the
Arab countries, economic and social disorder in the post-independence era and Arabs
defeat in the war against Israel and its allies in 1967.
During its short history, the narrative genre knew important stylistic and thematic
improvements which enabled it to depict the worries and concerns of Arabs in a more
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remarkable way than any other literary expression. Its unique aspects made it also the
suitable literary genre which could absorb and reflect the major transformations and
frustrations of Arab societies. Socially speaking, it succeeded in uncovering the hidden
and forbidden terrain oftaboos in the Arab culture. Sexual issues, patriarchal culture,
position of women became not only subjects of popular, but also part of serious debates.
Besides, the emergence of the Arabic novel helped in raising the issue of language;
meaning how to give Arabic new dimension other than its expressive function; how it
could become operative by establishing a new relationship and dialogue between
tradition and innovation; between Arabic literary legacy and foreign texts produced in,
and imported from, other parts of the world.
Any attempt at speaking about the historical development of the Arabic novel
must take into account two components, one historical and the other structural. In the first
case, the genre of the novel has no historical roots in Arab literary tradition. It is, rather, a
Western mode of expression which has been imitated by Arab writers who had direct
contact with or learned European languages and culture. In less than one century, the
Arabic novel attained its literary maturity, a transformation which took about three
centuries in Europe. This abridgment of time did not affect Arabs narrative experiences,
but it allowed Arab writers to broaden their perspectives, learn from their Western
fellows experiences and be able to choose the appropriate way to convey their message
or to share their literary imagining. In the second case, Arabic narrative writing did not
form one coherent whole. It was rather a series of individual and regional experiences full
of diversities. Herein, one should distinguish between two stages.
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The first is referred to as theBeginnings, a period which lasted from the end of the
19th century till the 40s of the last century. Early narratives are strongly influenced by
Western models and characterised by mixing between literary genres; that is to say,
mixing traditional forms, like maqama, travel narratives, chronicles etc with imported
Western narrative techniques, such as characterization, plot, setting etc. As Jeff Shalan
remarks:
Without a clear antecedent in the traditional forms of Arabic prose narrativethe
maqama, hadith, sira, qissa, khurafa, usturait was for the most part a group of
Syrian Christians who first introduced the novel to the Arab world through
nineteenth-century translations of European works , often adapted to the rhymed
prose form of the maqama. But a consequence of the Syrian migration that
followed the Lebanese massacre of 1860, and the strict code of censorship
imposed by the Ottoman administration in Syria, the center of literary activity had
shifted by the latter part of the nineteenth-century to Cairo where the climate was
more conductive to literary freedom, especially after 1882, when the British
protected it by law. With a still small but growing readership, the popularityand
thus the demandfor these translations and adaptations increased, and this in turn
gave some writers the incentive to begin writing novels of their own. But by the
large, these early experiments in the genre were unable to break free from the
formal and thematic constraints of traditional prose forms. (217)
The question of identity was a dominating theme of the first novels. It was
expressed through reconsidering the relationship between the personal and the collective
history as well as questioning the very functionality of tradition in an era of immense
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inter-cultural interactions. Being greatly influenced by Western achievements, Arab
writers started intensifying their efforts to spread new ways of looking at the world; they
called for a society governed by democracy and freedom (demands which most Arab
countries did not meet yet). Representative works of these innovative tendencies are the
historical novels of Jurji Zaydan, Ali Al-Jarem, Mohammed Farid and others. What
brings these novels together is their sincere attempt to restore the collective identity. To
attain this aim, early Arab novelists tried to restore Arab chivalric values and glorious
acts of the forefathers, by reviving special historical moments, events or figures that
could trigger Arabs collective consciousness.
Although many names and works appear in different critical studies as
fundamental, most critics agree that Jabran Khalil JabransAl- Ajniha Al-Moutakassira
(1911-12) (The Broken Wings) and Mohamed Husayn HyakalsZaynab, which appeared
first under the name ofMisri Fallah (An Egyptian Peasant) in 1913, are the first mature
modern novels in Arabic language. These novels resemble in their structure the
sentimental and rural novels of 18th century Europe obsessed by the mission and ambition
of fixing right behaviour, reforming conduct and exposing social evil. Immediate issues
found their way to these novels, particularly the critical position of Arab women in a
male oriented community. In these narratives, Arab society, mentality and culture are
harshly criticized and condemned for marginalising and silencing Arab women who
suffered since the dawn of history from male oriented systems of manipulation,
oppression and domination.Zaynab, for instance, is a rambling and sentimental story,
with at its coreapart from sub-plots that are never rounded offthe predicament of a
peasant girl who dies of consumption after being made to marry the man her father
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chooses for her rather than the one she loves. It is also noted for its sympathetic depiction
of rural life, and for its bold use of the colloquial in parts of the dialoguenot
throughout, as has often been asserted, but in the context of everyday life (Cachia 113).
Though employing some traditional techniques, like empirical style, poetic language etc,
these works fulfil the requirements of a complete novelistic writing because they
successfully utilise the fundamental aspects of the novel, like everyday speech, dialogue,
characterisation etc.
As for the second stage, which can be labeled as the Mature Stage, narrative prose
writing declared an abrupt break with all forms of Arab traditional expressions, like
maqama,sira, hikaya etc, which allowed it a full adherence to the club of the pioneering
figures of the Western novel. The literary enlightenment of the 1960s was the outcome of
a number of complex aesthetic and formal formations and transformations of a
considerable number of Arab writers from different Arab countries. Unlike their masters,
modern Arab novelists this time tackled their subject matter in a crafted and profound
way.Reality was no longer seen from the narrow perspective of culture and history, but
from a broader angle that put these components into scrutiny and interrogation; Arab
reality was looked at not as the result of the instant moment, but as a process which has
roots in history and tradition. Jabra Ibrahim Jabra points out that
The leit-motifs of the new writers were: freedom, anxiety, protest, struggle, social
progress, individual salvation, rebellion, heroism. There was to be commitment to
humanity: a Third World was being born and writers were its prophets.
Altogether, there was something in the air rather akin to what had happened in
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England and France twenty years earlierin the Thirties. Hemingway, a novelist
of action, became belatedly almost as popular as Sartre. (88)
These elements appear clearly in the works of many modern novelists, like the Egyptians
Jamal Al-Ghitani, Najib Mahfuz and others; the Sudanese Tayyib Salleh; the Lebanese
Elyas Khouri; the Syrian Hani Arahib; the Palestinian Ghassan Kanafani; the Algerian
Tahar Watar; or the Moroccan Mohammed Berrada.
In comparison with the East, narrative writing in Morocco began to appear only in
the late 20s. Despite of this delay, one can safely say that the Moroccan novel succeeds to
gain important and prestigious position in Arab and world literary circles. It succeeds also
to formulate its own independent questions that respond to the worries and inquiries of its
readers. The genre of the novel has been first imported to Morocco from the Arab East
and later from the West, especially from France. Other influential elements that have
played a crucial role in the development of the novel in Morocco are local forms of
expression which were popular at that time, namely travel narratives, historical accounts
and autobiographical writings.
Like elsewhere in Africa and the Arab world, the Moroccan novel of the first half
of the 20th century was occupied by promoting national ideologies and spreading the
culture of resistance and struggle, for the sake of freeing the nation from foreign
occupation. A great deal of these patriotic ideas was fuelled by Salfistideologies. They
called for the return to Islamic teachings and heritage in order to intensify social, cultural
and political reforms and to break free from the constraints of colonialism and rescue the
national and Islamic identity from French cultural influences. In the post-independence
era, literary endeavours were oriented towards discussing and revealing immediate
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political and national issues. In this atmosphere, Marxist and leftist thoughts flourished
under the banner of eradicating social injustices and political corruption. Literature,
according to this perspective, should become an instrument that reflected the disturbances
in the social and political system and responded to the demands of the middle and lower
classes. In a word, In [] the postcolonial era, Maghrebian writers focus on unearthing the
negative factors that erode Maghrebian society (Mortimer,Maghrebian 5).
During its history, the Moroccan novel used to be dependent on Eastern literary
models. It used to imitate Eastern themes and forms of expression and to follow its
patterns. Abdellah Guenoune argues:
The situation in Morocco [in the mid-19 th and the beginning of the 20th century]
was not suitable enough to give rise to any other form of expression than those
which were popular at that time [] Therefore, intellectual and literary activities
remained stagnant, imitating classical works in everything: themes, form and
style. Writers composed their books in the same way as their ancestors and
employed the same archaic techniques. ([translation from Arabic is mine] 17)
Accordingly, these works had no literary value, for they lacked the spirit of creation and
innovation. Guenoune concludes:
Yes there were writers and critics but their relation with the past was stronger than
with the modern age. Their literary production did not differ at all from those
written three centuries ago, though their authors were our contemporaries.
([translation from Arabic is mine] 17).
After the 60s, Moroccan narrative writing knew important developments which
have led to the birth of well-written and socially committed texts which have relied on
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the power of the imagination to reflect individual and collective concerns. In comparison
to the founding masters, the writers of the 60s dealt with their social reality in a more
complex way. They were forced to reconsider their ideas and views about the formation
and representation of reality and redesign the boundaries between the social and the
political. From 1975 onwards, when the political regime managed to put an end to the
revolutionary spirit of Moroccan leftist movements and to establish with force social
peace, Moroccan novelists, as well as the rest of the population, felt deeply disappointed
and deceived by their own patriots who proved to be a duplicate of the former colonisers.
To avoid being censored or getting into trouble with the official authorities, Moroccan
novelists chose to alienate themselves from society and politics and sought refuge in the
vast realm of the imagination. The writers Selfformulated the chief theme of the novels
written in the 70s and the early 80s. 1
Understandably, then, the 60s was a turning decade in the history of the Moroccan
novel. For many commentators, the mid 60s, precisely 1967, witnessed the birth of the
modern Moroccan fiction.Jil Adama(Generation of Thirst), written by the Moroccan
writer and philosopher Mohammed Aziz Lahbabi, is considered by many Moroccan
literary historians as the first work which responds to the criteria of a good novelistic
writing. Like Tayyib Sallehs Season of Migration to the North, a novel which I will
discuss in detail in the next chapter of this study, the protagonist of Lahbabi, Idriss, is an
intellectual who returned to his homeland after a long educational journey in Cairo where
he got his MA and after that in Sorbonne University where he was granted a Ph.D. The
big dilemma of Idriss is choosing; choosing between the Self and the various others: his
1 For more information, see the second chapter of Ahmed Almadinnis bookAl-Kitabba Sardeya fi Al-Adab
Al-Maghrebi Al-Hadith, Rabat: Dar Almaarif Al-JAdida, 2000, especially from page 67 till 71; Abdelali
Bou Tayyib, Arriwaya Al-Maghrebeya Al-AanAlittihad Al-Ichtiraki 02 Sept. 2005
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own society and the West where he used to live: Since his return to Morocco six months
ago, he lived in a world of confusion and obscurity because he could not choose
([translation from Arabic is mine] 51). Like all those who came from Europe, Idriss is
brought suffering from a double pressure: personal and social. After his European
journey, Idriss found himself forced to break free from the feeling of doubt caused by his
direct contact with Western culture. He wanted to be convenient to his society, by
transmitting his knowledge (teaching at the university) without giving up his hope of
being a writer, a feeling which allows him to be in peace with himself. There are other
critics who believe thatFi Toufoula (In Childhood) (1957) by Abdelmajid Ben Jelloun
should be honoured as the first Moroccan novel. Others think that Thami El-Ouzzanis
Zawya (The Saints Tomb) (1942) marks the real beginning of the Moroccan narrative
experience. There are even some views that relate the emergence of the Moroccan novel
to Ibn Al-Mokat and his workArihla Al-Morrakochiyya (The Marrakechian Journey)
appeared in 1924.
From this short survey, one can notice that the Moroccan novel appeared late in
comparison with the East and the West. Ahmed Al-Madini, a leading Moroccan critic and
writer, describes this retard as a double handicap. He argues: Concerning the
Moroccan novel, the problem was big since it embodied a double handicap. The first
handicap has to do with the history of its emergence; the second with its imitation of
Eastern models which had in their turn imitated Western ones ([translation from Arabic
is mine] 40). This explains why the majority of early works were formally poor and
aesthetically weak, likeAmtar A-Rahma (The Rains of Mercy) by Abderrahmane El-
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Merrini; Ghaddan Tatabadalo Al-Aard(Tomorrow will Change the Earth) by El-Bakrri
Sbai; andEnnaha Al-Hayat(Thats Life) by Mohammed El-Bounani etc.
From all that has been written till the end of the 60s, there are only five titles
which are granted a permanent place in the Moroccan literary repertoire. These novels are
Azzawya (The Saints Tomb) (1942) by Thami El-Ouazzani;Fi Toufoula (In Childhood)
(1957) by Abdelmajid Ben Jelloun; Sabato Abouab (Seven Gates) (1965) by Abdelkarim
Guellab; Dafanna Lmadi (We Buried the Past) (1966) by Abdelkarim Guellab; andJil
Addama(Generation of Thirst) (1967) by Mohammed Aziz Lehbabi. The main
characteristics of these works can be summarised in three main points: the reliance on
autobiographical elements, the representation of the European Other and the use of
European narrative techniques
The first outstanding characteristic of the early Moroccan fiction is the presence
of the writers autobiographical elements in their literary works. For Abdelah Laroui, a
Moroccan novelist and philosopher, the circulation of the fiction genre was the result of
creative influences and a sign of an independent self. For this reason, the novel hosted the
unique form of autobiography, to the extent that novel writing was during a long time a
synonym of the autobiographical ([translation from Arabic is mine] 155). The second
specification of this period is the problematic relationship between the Self and the
European Other, who makes often an essential part of the main plot. This can be clearly
seen in the autobiographical work of Abdelmajid Ben JellounsFi Toufolla (In
Childhood), which speaks about childhoods memories of a child torn between two
distinct environments: England and Morocco. The representation of the European Other
was dictated by the spirit of the age characterised by intense cultural contacts and
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numerous clashes. This confused relationship between the two worlds is also apparent in
narrative prose produced in other Arab regions, such asRihlat Osfour Mina Achark(A
Voyage of a Bird from the Orient) by Tawfik Alhakim,Kandil Om Hachim (The
Candlestick of Om Hachim) by Yahya Hakki, orMawssim Al-Hijjra Ila Ashamal(Season
of Migration to the North) by Tayyib Salleh. The third element that distinguishes this
eras prose fiction is the successful employment of the techniques of the novel. The
remarkable achievements of the foundational novels are their well imitation of both
Eastern and Western classics: telling a story, respecting the linearity of narration, using
omniscient narrators etc. Though the quality of these early works is not satisfactory
enough, one can argue that they manage to establish the basis for a pure Moroccan fiction
and to pave the way for the coming generations of Moroccan writers.
Unlike the 60s, the 70s was an era of political turmoil. As a consequence of the
wrong and unjust policies of the post-independence governments, policies which have led
to terrible social, political and economic conditions, the majority of the population felt
deceived and cheated by their political elites2. This unstable situation was behind the
bloody confrontation, the so called the Years of the Bullets, between different
Moroccan ideological and political movements and the state; between those who profited
from the new situation and those who did not. Not only have national events left a
negative impact on Moroccan collective consciousness, but also other events that took
place elsewhere in the Arab world, namely Israelo- Palestinian clash and the negative
effects of the Arab defeat against Israel in 1967. Writers like Mohammed Zafzaf,
Abdelkarim Guellab, Mobarrak Rabi and Mohamed Choukri, were the representative
2 Ahmed Almadinni,Al-Kitabba Sardeya fi Al-Adab Al-Maghrebi Al-Hadith, Rabat: Dar Almaarif Al-
JAdida, 2000, pp. 67-71
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figures of Realism in the Moroccan novel: The new writers were interested on themes
which deal with their new society and the specificities of the historical experience. They
were interested on expressing their peoples thoughts and ideologies as well as their
misery, ignorance, poverty and backwardness. ([translation from Arabic is mine] Azzam
13). To name some aspects that marked this period, one can, for instance, refer to the use
of the problematic heromost of the time heroism is restricted to intellectuals from the
middle class; social and political criticism; the utilisation of a simple language that rejects
the stylistic extravagances of classical Arabic literature etc.
These socio-cultural conditions gave birth to modern literary ideas which
considered the innovation of Moroccan literary writing as an urgent priority. The interest
on narrative techniques and its various mechanisms became one of the main concerns of
the Moroccan novelists. Novels followed no longer the linearity of events and the
classical conventions of plot, but became highly fragmented and modernist. Indeed, they
adopted intra- and intertextual strategies. That is to say, modern experimental novels
employed meta-narrative techniques, such as dialogues between the narrator and the
characters or that of the narrator with the author as we shall see in the discussion of
Mohammed Barradas The Game of Forgetting, or engage in an intertextual relationship
with other texts through citing, alluding or parodying them as we find in a recent work of
Mohammed Berrada, The Woman of Forgetting(2001), which is a hypertext of his first
novel The Game of Forgetting(1987).
In addition to their interest on modern techniques, Moroccan writers relied on the
power of imagination as an essential source of inspiration. Old themes, such as
independence, colonialism, poverty, democracy, justice, backwardness, liberty, struggle
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etc, gave place to egocentric subjects, in which writers own inquiries and daily
experiences are made representative of the rest of the population. These innovative
qualities have helped in bridging the gap between writers and their reading public who
became interactive and participants in actualising the literary work. Contemporary
Moroccan readers became no longer passive consumers of Moroccan literary products,
but critical readers. Critical readers are meant by the critics and the intellectuals who
followed an academic education; this category forms a very small minority in a country
which suffers from a reading crisis and whose bestselling titles are less than 3000 copy.
Even more privileged than the Moroccan fiction is the Algerian, since it has been
influenced and strengthened by local, Arab and European elements that caused its
literature to obtain a remarkable position in Arab and world literary map. The fusion of
Berber local specificities and Arabo-Islamic spirit with the French language and culture
has added to the peculiarity of the Algerian narrative experience. According to Laroussi,
the use of French does not mark a historical movement, but a direct representation of
Algerian society:
La langue franaise nest-elle plus la marque dun mouvement historique (cent
trente deux ans de colonisation), mais une prsentation directe de la socit
algrienne, cest--dire un faux mouvement puisque depuis lindpendance la
culture arabo-berbre inverse le rapport de domination franaise sans le
supprimer. Il y a en Algrie une coupure irrationnelle entre se dire et tre,
do le climat durgence de sa littrature. (55)
In this rich cultural context, the Algerian novel in French developed, reflecting a history
full of diversity, contest and resistance, which explains the omnipresence of themes of
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nationalism and resistance in the Algerian novel in both French and Arabic. Mohammed
Dib, Kateb Yacine, Malek Haddad, Assia Djebar and others are becoming international
names who have a large reading public not only in their homeland Algeria, but in the rest
of the globe as well.
World literature is full of examples of writers who wrote in other languages than
their mother tongues. The Algerian novel of French expression is a special cultural and
linguistic phenomenon which succeeded in triggering important critical debate varied
from views which include it within the category of the Arab novel (its themes and subject
matters spring from Arabs socio-cultural context), whereas some views, and these
represent the majority, consider it as an Algerian novel written in French, for language is
the medium which indicates the identity of ones literature. Algerian writers refuse the
idea of categorising their fiction either within Arab or French literary tradition, for they
believe that the Algerian case and reality are unique. They believe also that their
relationship with French is that of embattlement, dismantlement and subversion. Farid
Laroussi points out:
[Le romancier Algrien] refuse lalternative entre tre un crivain arabe ou un
crivain moderne, parce que, justement, les normes de validation culturelles ne
sont pas intrinsquement et naturellement occidentales. A la violence de la
mission universaliste franaise, lauteur algrien cherche opposer celle dun r-
enracinement et ce en dpit des dissonances nes de lemploi de la langue
franaise. (54)
For many commentators, like Jean Djeux, the real beginning of the Algerian
novel in French took place in 1925 the date of the publication of Abdelkader Hadj
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Hammous novelZohra: la Femme du Mineur, where he tried to imitate the techniques of
Emile ZolasNaturalistic novel. This text and others, like that of Sliman Benbrahim,
Mohamed Oualdcheikh and others, were merely imitations of French colonial texts which
have portrayed the Algerian man as the exotic, backward and uncivilised Other who is
different, yet convenient to the French Self. For Hafnaoui Ba-Ali, early Algerian texts in
French are characterised by a clear linearity which presented the Algerians in the same
consumed exotic image as French colonial narratives. Technically speaking, these texts
were aesthetically and thematically poor, for they could not break free from presenting
simple love stories between the locals and the settlers. In these stories, the image of the
Algerian is either that of a nave and simple or of an evil and violent. Ba-Ali states:
These authors were writing for the French Other, trying to show them that
Algerians are able to write as good as any civilised European. But the inquiries
and the problems raised in these texts could not go beyond the simple exhibition
of theAlgerian as a context and subject of entertainment and folklore, with its
consumptive degrading meaning. The movement of the Algerian novel in French
started to establish for itself a literary repertoire which could reflect the Algerian
Self and the ambitions of this man who inhabited North Africa ([translation from
Arabic is mine] 3).
Other critics, like Charles Bonn, mentioned that the beginning of the Algerian
novel of French expression took place in 1950 which coincided with the publication of
Fils du Pauvre (The Poor Mans Son) by Mouloud Feraoun. Feraoun is considered as one
of the best North African novelists who write in French and his novel,Fils du Pauvre, as
an authentic celebration of the heroic qualities of the Kbayli Algerian man. The events
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took place in a small and calm village called Tizy, where the poor mans son, Forlo, was
born and grown up. The village is at the same time a prototypical space of a typical rural
community where life was still governed by traditional cultural norms handed down from
one generation to another. Central to this novel is the contest between the local cultural
identity and that imposed by the French occupier through his language, educational
system etc. Feraouns text is to certain extents an autobiographical novel which describes
the authors childhood and adolescence. Thus, the use of autobiography is an element
which is to be detected in most early North African novels of both Arabic and French:
Lmergence du je dans la littrature maghrbine de la langue franaise depuis
les annes 50 nest pas a comprendre comme une rduction purement et
simplement a notre personnalisme de plus en plus accentue des socits ne
faisaient pas suffisamment sa place a la personne (autonome et responsable) en
tant que telle. La cration romanesque dans lactivit scripturale est donc bien ici
lieu privilgie ou cette personne peut saffirmer et donc, par le fait mme ; entre
en conflit ; mais aussi sortir du communautarisme et du conformisme pour tre
une personne a part entire. (Djeux quoted in Kelly 26)
IfFils du Pauvre is seen as the real beginning of the Algerian novel of French
expression, Katib Yacines remarkable workNejma is described as one of the best
Algerian novels, for it managed to represent in a deliberate way the countrys critical
situation under the French rule. In this work, Yacine, through his central character
Nejma, is occupied with the idea of searching for his own homeland and identity. Nejma
is the spirit of the Algerian revolution; an emblem of the whole country, the maternal
space where lies ones roots and memories. The structure and the style of the novel are
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highly modernist as it can be seen in the use of stream of consciousness, myth,
fragmentation and the violation of standard conventions of classical writing. Postmodern
elements, like the subversion of French language, are also to be found in YacinesNejma.
This is what Larroussi noticed in his article about the genealogy of Algerian literature in
French:
Le phnomne dcriture post-modern possde, chez Kateb Yacine ou Rachid
Boujedra, le caractre d'une dmonstration idologique ; comme sil sagissait de
faire une seconde rvolution algrienne. Leurs romans, de par le choix de la
langue franaise, est une forme de reconnaissance que le sujet existe par ses actes,
mais quon ne peut lui prter les ides qui correspondent a ses actes quil
accompli: bref, se dire en franais pour ne plus tre franais, voila ou rside la
singularit. Comme dans le couple Prospro-Caliban il faut que le matre
europen cde au gnie indigne non-europen. Ce choix de franais, tout aussi
imposant quil parait, est donc le contraire dune adhsion. (56)
For Katib Yacine and other Algerian novelists, narrative writing is a form of resistance
against any attempt of cultural deformation or assimilation. It is a way to keep witness to
what happened in the historical experience as well as to give Algerian man and woman
their respect back.
Together with their male fellow citizens, Francophone Algerian women writers
have contributed to the development of the Algerian novel and the enrichment of the
discussion about crucial issues, such as race, language, identity, gender, ethnicity, culture
and nationalism. Writers like Assia Djebbar, Marie-Louise Amrouche and others
presented gendered views of Algerias personal and collective history during French
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occupation and after independence. Their literature came also as a reaction against the
imposition of colonial cultural norms which called for the rejection of traditional social
rules which organise the relationship between sexes. They rejected the idea of being
westernised. Meriam Cooke sums up the situation as follows:
Some strongly criticised the biculturalism inheritent in a [French educational]
system that promoted womens self-confidence and self-assertion outside the
home but crashed any sign of autonomy within. Indeed, it was those of Algerian
women who perceived the double standards of their education who were pioneers
of francophone fiction in the Arab world. Unlike the men who wrote just before
and after the revolution of 1954-61, the women did not write to distance
themselves from the French but rather to understand their situation in a bicultural
society. (141).
One of the outstanding themes of francophone Algerian novel now is the clash
between tradition and modernity; between ones culture and external influences. The
contemporary Algerian novel deals in a new way with these antagonistic components, by
reviving the glorious achievements of the national heroic figures; redefining the
relationship between the sexes; and asserting its aesthetic, linguistic and stylistic
autonomy as an independent literary form which opposed French cultural hegemony.
Indeed, it engages in a dialogue with the past and the present; with the colonial history
and modern Algerian society and in the midst the political and social disorder caused by
the armed confrontation between Islamist movements and political authorities. By doing
so, it aims at reflecting about the flaws, greed and blood thirst of the past and present,
opinions which so often can cause ominous danger to its writers.
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III. The Relationship between Europe and the Arab World in Tayyib Sallehs
Season of Migration to the North
Re-considering the relationship between Europe and the Arab world is one of the
dominating features in the novel chosen to be the subject of this chapter, Season of
Migration to the North by the Sudanese novelist, Tayyib Salleh. In this part, I will discuss
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the relationship between Europe and the colonial Others, focusing more particularly on
the genre of the novel as a form of writing back to the centre. I will also try to show that
the novels problematisation of European systems of thought serves many purposes, some
of which are to establish a dialogue with, as well as to react against, European models of
domination, by involving in a dialectical relationship between European colonial heritage
and the re-created independent local identity.
No Arabic novel attained much discussion and investigation as that of Tayyib
Sallehs Season of Migration to the North because it manages successfully to represent the
dichotomy and historical conflict between East and West and to raise the question of cultural
and national identity of the post-colonial Sudan.3Salleh aims in this work to describe the
reality of the post-independence Sudan by providing two distinct views of the Sudans
national identity. Though the novel does not give a clear answer to this question, one can
safely say that British presence in the region has led to a fracturing of Sudanese identity;
an identity torn between the material allure of modernity, egoism and materialism, and
the perceived spirituality, originality and purity of Arabo-Islamic legacy; between the fact
of a hybrid present and the myth of an authentic past; in short, an identity which is left
with no other choice but to forget about the past and cope with the modern reality.
According to Saree Makdisi,
The novel lies between the traditional categories of East and Westthat
confusing zone in which the culture of an imperial power clashes with that of its
3 This novel of Tayyib Salleh has been widely received in the Arab countries and the west. Many reviews,
essays and books have been devoted to the analysis and discussion of this work. A partial listing of these
works: Fatima Musa. Usfur min al-Janub aw Alam al-Tayyib Salih.Al- Majalla 164 (1970): 95-102;
Muhammad Zaghlul Salam.Dirasat fi al-Qissa al-Arabiyya al-Haditha. Alexanderia: Munshaat al-
Maarif, 1973: 428-437; Ahmad Said Muhamadiyya (ed).Al-Tayyib Salih: Abqari al-Riwaya
al-Arabiyya. Beirut: Dar al-Wda, 1976 etc. For a complete list, see Ami Elad-Bouskilas article Shaping
the Cast of Characters: the Case of Al-Tayyib Salih.Journal of Arabic Literature 19.2 (1998) pp. 59-60.
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victimsthe antithetical relationship between which provides much of its driving
force. This is the same dynamic that has generated many of the contradictions
now characteristic of other postcolonial societies that manifest themselves in the
clash between such categories as the modern and the traditional, the new and
old ways of life, and of course between Western and native cultures and values.
(807)
In Season of Migration to the North, Tayyib Salleh departs from the assumption
that the imposition of Western culture on the region has caused irretrievable damage at all
levels of life in the Sudan. He emphasises that British culture is foreign to the Sudan and
its people; a culture which is incompatible with the regions historical, social, religious
and cultural specificities. In this respect, Sallehs text comes as a reaction against the
bitter history of British colonial and cultural hegemony. In this counter-narrative, Salleh
tries to recast the history of the relationship between Britain and the Sudan, by
investigating the key concepts that govern the relationship between the two worlds.
These issues are embedded in the stories of two Arab citizens who return to their
homeland, the Sudan, after the experience of living in Europe. The first story, with which the
narrative opens, is that of a man, the narrator, who returns to his village at the curve of the
Nile after spending seven years in Britain, studying literature at one of its universities: It
was, gentlemen, after a long absenceseven years to be exact, during which time I was
studying in Europethat I returned to my people (1). The other story is that of Mustafa
Said, a former university teacher of Economics at the University of London, who appears
suddenly in the narrators small village, marries one of its women and becomes one of its
inhabitants: My father said that Mustafa was not a local man but a stranger who had come
here five years ago, had bought himself a farm, built a house and married Mahmouds
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daughtera man who kept himself to himself and about whom not much was known (2).
The portrayal of the narrator and Mustafa Said reflects on the conflicting options embodied in
their characters. One is moderate, the narrator, who seeks to bridge the gap between his
Eastern culture and Western norms, by pointing out that both cultures have strong qualities
and, at the same time, their shortcomings:
Yes, there are some farmers among them [Europeans]. Theyve got everything
workers and doctors and farmers and teachers, just like us. I preferred not to say the
rest that had come to my mind: that just like us they are born and die, and in the
journey from the cradle to the grave they dream dreams some of which come true and
some of which are frustrated; that they fear the unknown, search for love and seek
contentment in wife and child; that some are strong and some are weak; that some
have been given more than they deserve by life, while others have been deprived by
it, but that the differences are narrowing and most of the weak are no longer weak.
(3).
The figure of Mustafa Said, however, represents anti-West tendencies that call for revenging
against former colonial powers:
They [Europeans] imported to us the germ of the greatest European violence, as seen
on the Somme and at Verdun, the like of which the world has never previously
known, the germ of a deadly disease that struck them more than a thousand years ago.
Yes, my dear sirs, I came as an invader into your very homes: a drop of the poison
which you have injected into the veins of history. (95)
The novels concern with serious issues such as colonial guilt and the issue of
national identity manifest the spirit of embattlement which characterises what Fredric
Jameson calls, third-world literatures, namely to [draw] upon the many different
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indigenous local and hybrid processes of self-determination to defy, erode and sometimes
supplant the prodigious power of imperial cultural knowledge (Aschroft, et al 1)4.
According to Frederic Jameson, all texts produced in the former colonies have the
specificity of being national allegories. This notion is made evident in the opening
statements which describe the experience of the return of the native from the West. This
return enables the character to reconsider anew the tension between colonial and colony
cultures; between Western values and Eastern ones:
For seven years I had longed for [my people], had dreamed of them, and it was an
extraordinary moment when I at last found myself standing amongst them. They
rejoiced at having me back and made a great fuss, and it was not long before I felt as
though a piece of ice were melting inside of me, as though I were some frozen
substance on which the sun had shonethat life warmth of the tribe which I had lost
for a time in a land whose fishes die of the cold. (1)
The narrators migration to the north opens to him new worlds. Not only does he enlarge his
intellectual capacities, but also gets acquainted with the culture of the former coloniser. This
northern experience has also offered him the opportunity to correct his ideas about Europeans
and to refashion his relationship with his own country and people. What can be deduced from
this prelude is that the narrators views towards Europe are not affected by any political or
religious ideologies and his northern journey has not shaken his singular and well-rooted
sense of identity (Geesey, Cultural130). He lived among Europeans without loving them or
hating them. For seven years he was occupied with one thing, to return back to his small
village and embrace his people.
4 Fredric Jamesons article Third World Literature in the Era of Multinationalism. Social Text 15 (1986),
is very questionable. For responses, see the remarkable article of Aijaz Ahmad, Jamesons Rhetoric of
Otherness and the National Allegory. Social Text17 (1987).
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Being open to both worlds and speaking from the in-between space, the narrator
fulfils the role of a mediator between his own Arabo-Islamic culture and the Euro-Christian.
Throughout the narrative, he keeps neutral. He never passes value judgments or criticises the
West as most of his fellow citizens. On the contrary, he asserts that European culture is like
any other culture in the world. It has good and bad sides at the same time and Europeans are,
after all, human beings who do not differ that much from the rest of the human species. They
are with minor differences, exactly like [his people] marrying and bringing their children in
accordance with principles and traditions, that they [have] good morals and [are] in general
good people (3). He seeks then to take distance from any ideology which contains deeper
significance other than what his words literally imply. That is to say, he did not feel at home
in England simply because he wanted to live where he belongs:
I looked through the window at the palm tree standing in the courtyard of our house
and I knew that all was still with life. I looked at its strong straight trunk, at its roots
that strike down into the ground, at the green branches hanging down into the ground,
at the green branches hanging down loosely over its top, and I experienced a feeling
of assurance, I felt not like a storm-swept feather but like that palm tree, a being with
background, with roots, with a purpose. (2)
The palm tree, deep rooted in the soil of the house, gives the narrator the impression of
stability, certainty and assurance. He tries to bring a link between his actual situation and
that of the tree. Differently put, after his long absence abroad, he could finally settle
down and have, like the palm tree, strong roots and a mission in life.
In this novel, Salleh encounters national discourse as an imaginative composite.
The sense of belonging which kept haunting Seasons narrator during his stay abroad or
the myths of nationalism which ruined Mustapha Saids life are imaginative and self-
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inventive constructs meant to free the self from the burdens of the colonial past and the
oppression of the deformed national reality. They aim also at reaffirming ones pre-
colonial culture and traditional ways of life in an attempt to give life in the former
colonies its local original specificity. The narrator ofSeasons nationalism has to be
understood by aligning it, not with self-consciously held political ideologies, but with the
large cultural systems that preceded it, out of which [] it came into being (Anderson
12). Moving from the metropolis to the countryside, the narrator starts revising the myth of
the Sudans cordiality. In the second day of his stay at the village, he begins reconsidering his
nostalgic feelings and romantic ideas about the paradise-like village and the angel-like
people. He discovers that the village that used to constitute his dreams and imagination is no
longer there. Instead, another transformed reality has taken place. In the new village,
pumps are used in place of water-wheels, iron ploughs instead of wooden ones, and
whisky and beer became the favourite beverage of the villagers instead of arak and millet
wine (100). He notices that the village has lost its peculiarity and charm and became a place
of contradictions. It is neither modern nor traditional, but hybrid:
From my position under the tree I saw the village slowly undergo a change: the
water-wheels disappeared to be replaced on the bank of the Nile by pumps, each one
doing the work of a hundred water-wheels. I saw the bank retreating year after year in
front of the thrusting of the water, while on another part it was the water that
retreated. Sometimes strange thoughts would come to my mind. Seeing the bank
contracting at one place and expanding at another, I would think that such was life:
with a hand it gives, with the other it takes. (5)
The invasion of Western modernity couldnt put an end to old and archaic practices,
such as patriarchy. A case in a point is the arranged marriage of Wad Rayyes, one of the
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inhabitants of the village known by his several marriages, with the widow of Mustafa Said,
Hosna Bint Mahmoud; a marriage which caused enormous chaos in the village when Hosna
killed Wad Rayyes and later her self. The village thus embodies the dual face of life in post-
colonial Sudan. The position of women in this changing world of the village/ Sudan remains
the same, for liberating women is not convenient for the male members of the community.
Therefore, they remain subject to marginality, oppression and silencing carefully and
systematically conducted by patriarchal dominated culture. They are not allowed the
opportunity to function and express themselves freely, but are controlled and spoken
about. Worse, they are considered as male properties; as something that belongs to men
(99). Reacting angrily against his grandfathers traditional views about the role and
position of women, the narrator affirms:
Anger checked my tongue and I kept silent. The obscene pictures sprang
simultaneously to my mind and to my extreme astonishment, the two pictures
merged: I imagined Hosna Bint Mahmoud, Mustafa Saeeds widow, as being the
same woman in both instances: two white, wide-open thighs in London, and a
woman groaning before dawn in an obscure village on a bend of the Nile under
the weight of the aged Was Rayyes. If that other thing was evil, this too was evil,
and if this was like death and birth, the Nile flood and the wheat harvest, a part of
the system of the universe, so too was that. I pictured Hosna Bint Mahmoud,
Mustafa Saeeds widow, a woman in her thirties, weeping under seventy-year-old
Wad Rayyes. Her weeping would be made the subject of Was Rayyess famous
stories about his many women with which he regales the men of the village. (86-
87)
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would wear a turban like the one the man is wearing. The British soldier laughed and
corrected him that what he has on is not a turban, but a hat: this is isnt a turban, he said.
It is a hat. (20). When the man wanted to do a favour to the child by placing his hat on his
head, Saids whole face disappeared inside it (20). This incident is symbolic enough as it
shows that colonial educational mission is meant by to demolish ones identity and make the
natives absorb and believe in the values and virtues assigned to them; to teach them to
submit, be convenient and say Yes. In her discussion of the novel, Benitta Parry remarks
that Saids educational history is a symbolic journey of natal displacement, alienation from
the English and revenge against the North, pieced together and reworked by the narrator from
the spoken and written words of a tormented immoralist and angry anti-colonialist consumed
by ressentimenta concept, according to Frederic Jameson, devised by late-nineteenth
century ideology to explain not only the revolt of mobs, but also the revolutionary vocation
of disaffected intellectuals (74).
Mustafa Said assigns himself the mission of revenging to his people from the former
coloniser, by causing pain to British women. The body of his British lovers becomes the
arena where Said has conducted his violent revenge. In his discussion of the novel, Saree
Makdissi notices that Saids reaction against the violent crimes of imperialism is fought on a
personal level and powered by Arab war metaphors. Makdisi points out that Saids
conquests are couched not only in terms of military operations in general, but in terms of
traditionalArab military campaigns in particular: going to meet new victims is described in
terms of saddling his camel; the process of courtship is compared to laying siege, involving
tents, caravans, the desert, and so forth (811). By doing so, he wants to bring back to the
British their disease of violence and invading them in the heart of their country: Yes, my
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dear sirs, I came as an invader into your very homes: a drop of the poison which you have
injected into the veins of history (95).
Another element which highlights the novels reactionary spirit against the colonial
rule is the investment of historical registers of religious confrontations between Muslims and
the Crusaders. The symbolic importance of recollecting this historical process brings to light
East/West sensibilities and what Samuel Huntington called the clash of civilisations.For
ages, Muslims and Christians consider each others as a real danger that threatens ones
religious and cultural identity. Since the invasion of Spain by the Arabs at the 8 th century
and that of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, the two poles and religions were never in peace:
For a moment I imagined to myself the Arab soldiers first meeting with Spain: like me at
this instant sitting opposite Isabella Seymour, a southern thirst being dissipated in the
mountain passes of history in the north (42). Similar memories are going to come to the
surface when Said was judged for murdering his English wife: I hear the rattle of the swords
in Carthage and the clatter of hooves of Allenbys horses desecrating the ground of
Jerusalem (94-5). Within this context of embattlement and misunderstanding emerged
Saids extreme attitudes towards the West. His hatred and revenge are inspired by ancient
hostile sentiments which have a history. For Saree Makdisi, the date of birth of Mustafa
Said is linked with an important moment in the history of the Sudan. 1898, the date of
birth of Said, is the year of the bloody defeat of Mahdist forces by Kitcheners army in
the battle of Omdurman, which signalled the final collapse of Sudanese resistance to
British encroachment (811). Symbolic enough is the year 1956Said disappears in this
year, may be drowning in the Nile, but we are never sure. To be precise, on January the
1st , 1956 the Sudan becomes an independent country. It seems, then, as if Mustafa
Saids resentment plays itself out in accordance with Frederic Jamesons account of
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Nietzsches negative category as the revenge of the slaves upon the masters and an
ideological ruse whereby the former infect the latter with a slave mentality () in order
to rob them of their natural vitality and aggressive, properly aristocratic insolence
(Parry 80).
To carry out his historical revenge, Said relies on his academic knowledge so as to
dismantle and subvert the systems of power that give rise and contribute in the formation
and emergence of British colonial power. After the dubious disappearance of Said, the
narrator wants to solve the enigma of Saids past; therefore, he decides to enter Saids
private room reserved to his souvenirs and private collections. When he gets in, he finds
an enormous collection of books from different fields of knowledge: poetry,
mathematics, history, economics, psychology etc. Among these books, he finds a number
of publications written by Mustafa Said himself:
The books I could see in the light of the lamp that they were arranged in
categories. Books on economics, history and literature. Zoology. Geology.
Mathematics. Astronomy. The Encyclopaedia Britannica. Gibbon. Macaulay.
Toynbee. The complete works of Bernard Shaw. Keynes. Tawney. Smith.
Robinson. The Economics of Imperfect competition. HobsonImperialism.
RobinsonAn essay on Marxian Economics. Sociology. Anthropology.
Psychology. Thomas Hardy. Thomas Mann. E.G. Moore. Thomas Moore.
Virginia Woolf. Wittgenstein. Einstein. Bierly. Namier. Books I had heard of and
others I had not. Volumes of poetry by poets of whom I did not know the
existence. The Journals of Gordon. Gullivers Travels. Kipling. Housman. The
History of French Revolution Thomas Carlyle.Lectures on the French Revolution
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Lord Acton. Books bound in leather. Books in paper covers. Old tattered books
that looks as if theyd just come straight from the printers. Huge volumes the size
of tombstones. Small books with gilt edges the size of packs playing cards.
Signatures. Words of dedication. Books in boxes. Books on the chairs. Books on
the floor. What play is acting this? What does he mean? Owen. Ford. Madox
Ford. Stefan Zweig. E. G. Browne. Laski. Hazlitt.Alice in the Wonderland.
Richards. The Koran in English. The Bible in English. The Economics of
Colonialism Mustafa Saeed. The Cross and Gunpowder Mustafa Saeed.
Prospero and Caliban. Totem and Taboo. Doughty. Not a single Arabic book. A
graveyard. A mausoleum. An insane idea. A prison. A huge joke. A treasure
chamber. (137-8).
Foucaults concern of the link between knowledge and power helps in setting up a
linkage between Saids massive book collections and his revenging mission5. Singling
out the intellectual mechanisms that play part in the emergence and elaboration of British
colonial mission, Said formulates, thanks to his readings, his own anti-colonial strategies;
a corresponding conceptual system through which he could problematise the different
forms of domination that settle underneath British colonial discourse. The thesis that Said
wants to prove is that British colonial body of knowledge condenses statements and ways
of dealing, thinking and seeing the Sudan which in turn help in the emergence of the
colonial power. British presence in the area was not driven by any noble motives, such as
5 After the failure of the leftist uprising in May 1968, Michel Foucault aimed this time not at investigatingthe social conditions of knowledge as elaborated in his book, The Order of Things, but at investigating the
practice of power through social systems. In his inaugural lecture, The Order of Discourse, after his
appointment to the Collge de France in 1970, Foucault drew up the major lines of his future work, by
stating that discourse is a complex network of social, political and cultural relations in which become
apparent the ways by which language, at the level of signs, is produced as a discourse, carrying beneath its
surface power and danger. For more information, see Rosi Braidotti,Nomadic Subjects, Cambridge: Polity
Press, 1991.
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that of civilising and educating the brutes as claimed by one of his professors at Oxford:
You, Mr Saeed, are the best example of the fact that our civilizing mission in Africa is
of no avail (93). For him, British presence in the region was purely for economic and
political reasons, as the American-Palestinian thinker, Edward Said, developed later in
his bookOrientalism (1978): my contention is that without examining Orientalism as a
discourse one cannot possibly understand the enormously systematic discipline by which
European culture was able to manage and produce the Orient politically,
sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post-
Enlightenment period (3). If Britain has used knowledge and its advanced weapons to
claim power over his people, Said also used similar strategies, but this time by employing
his intellect and his sexual capacities to accomplish his campaign.
Saids domineering personality causes him big troubles in his life. As the outcome
of his suspicious love affairs with a number of British women ended up with an act of
murder and a trial, Said loses his job at the university and was forced to leave London. In
the narrative, there is a parallel between the situation of Said and that of Shakespeares
Othello. While seducing his English victims, Said identifies himself with Othello. He
asserts that he and Othello share the same origin and belong to the same race: Im like
Othello Arab-African (38). Like Said, Othello is a Moor, an Arab hero who managed to
obtain a high military and civil position in the Western Venetian society. He is also the
product of European civilisation that turned him from a historical enemy, to a servant of
European interests. He, too, was married to a European and killed her out of revenge. Though
Said shares with Othello these qualities, he believes that the character of Othello is simply a
lie; a stereotypical representation of Arabs as unreasonable and hot tempered folk, which
evokes the complex confrontations of Self/Other. According to Ferial Ghazoul, the
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relationship of the modern Arab World to modern Europe is based neither on equality nor on
fraternity, but on dependency and subjugation, the literary dialogue between the two is
likely to be sharp and polemical. The history of a text like Othello will necessarily show a
variety of such reactions, starting with pleasure derived from the presence of the Self in the
canon of the Other, to anger and the deformation of the Self in a distorting mirror (1).
However, Said, while in court, starts to think again when he sees that his lawyer,
Professor Maxwell Foster-Keen, pictures him as a helpless victim of the colonial process;
as a person who has no command on his behaviour: Mustafa Saeed, gentlemen of the
jury, is a noble person whose mind was able to absorb Western civilisation but broke his
heart. These girls were not killed by Mustafa Saeed but by the germ of a deadly disease
that assailed them a thousand years ago (33). As a reaction against this parallelism,
though implicitly, between his case and that of Othello, Said thinks to himself that his
situation is different. It occurred to him that he should stand up and say to them: this is
untrue, a fabrication. It was I who killed them. I am the desert of thirst. I am no Othello. I
am a lie. Why dont you sentence me to be hanged and so kill the lie? (33). In a later
instance in the novel, the narrator recalls Saids words he wished he had uttered at the
court: Yes, my dear sirs, I came as an invader into your very homes: a drop of the poison
which you have injected into veins of history. I am no Othello. Othello was a lie (95).
Said insists that Othello does not exist, a lie, because he is a fabrication and a product
of Western imagination that exoticises and estranges the Other in order to show that this
Other stands in the opposite side of the European Self, as unreasonable, immoral and
untrustworthy. Saids invocation of Othello either as a weapon for seduction or as a
mental note expressed in defence is a pivotal concept for understanding the notion of
cultural contagion forSeason of Migration to the North (Geesey, Cultural 134).
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The traditional cultural struggle between East/West, coloniser/colonised,
master/slave and Self/Other is at the core of Sallehs narrative. This dialectic between
these distinct and contradictory worlds is part of the discourse of postcolonialism and
characteristic of nations having been affected by the experience of colonialism and
imperialism. Said resists the idea of being coined with Othello because he does not want to
inhabit an in-between space; to become hybrid as Othello, who is an archetypal mirage that
stands between the cultures of the West and the East (Geesey, Cultural 135). As an
intellectual, he is aware of the trap of hybridity, for he is by no means an emblem of cultural
hybridity, whose character is the resulting offspring from the colonial union of Great Britain
and Arabo-African nation of the Sudan [] a less than happy intermingling of East and
West as Patricia Geesey suggests (Cultural 129). On the contrary, Said represents a pure and
uncontaminated spirit of the Sudan; one of the warriors ofOmdurman who did not give up
but continues the struggle against the invaders till dropping them out of the land. He
disappears only after establishing peace and restoring life in the Sudan to its earlier order
before the coming of the British. The only character in the novel who is hybrid is the narrator
because he is the one who is affected by East/West cultural contact. Unlike Said, the narrator
inhabits the third space or the in-between space since he carries the mission of mediating
between two extremes. He passes perfectly in Bhabhas formula of third world or
postcolonial intellectuals. Homi K. Bhabha argues:
It is significant that the productive capacities of this Third Space have a colonial or
post-colonial provenance. For a willingness to descend into that alien territory
where I have led you may reveal that the theoretical recognition of the split-space of
enunciation may open the way to conceptualising an international culture, based not
on the exoticism or multi-culturalism of the diversity of cultures, but on the
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inscription and articulation of cultures hybridity. To that end we should remember
that it is the inter the cutting edge of translation and negotiation, the in-between,
the space of the entre that Derrida has opened up writing itself that carries the
burden of the meaning of culture. It makes it possible to begin envisaging national,
anti-nationalist, histories of the people. It is this space that we will find those words
with which we can speak of Ourselves and Others. And by exploring this hybridity,
this Third Space, we may elude the politics of polarity and emerge as the others of
our selves. (209)
In addition to negotiating between his Oriental self and the Occidental Other, the
narrator fulfils the position of Derridas entre modernism and traditionalism. Not long after
his arrival, the narrator discovers that the characteristics which used to give the village its
special peculiarity start to fade away, giving place to other modern aspects. Though he feels
for a while disappointed, the narrators stand remain neutral with regard to these
transformations, for he is aware of the fact that his village could not remain forever authentic
and unaffected by the wind of change. Actually, what upsets him most and makes him
reconsider his idealistic ideas is the double face of the village. As Mahjoub, a friend of the
narrator, affirms, some things have changed pumps instead of water-wheels, iron ploughs
instead of wooden ones, sending our daughters to school, radios, cars, learning to drink
whisky and beer instead of arak and millet wine yet even so everythings as it was (100).
The allusion here is to the practice of patriarchy, deep rooted in the villages culture. In a
mocking voice, Mahjoub tells the narrator that it is an out-and-out impossibility to
eradicate such practices. The villages reaction to Hosnas murdering of her imposed husband
Wad Rayyes shows that life in the village is still governed by traditional customs. Being a
woman, Hossna is left with no other choice but to marry that old man, even though she hates
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him, simply because her father could not withdraw his promise: A week or ten days after
you went away her father said he had given Was Rayyes a promise and they married her off
to him. Her father swore at her and beat her; he told her shed marry him whether she liked it
or not (122). For the villagers, Hosna is associated with the devil because she does not
accept to continue playing old roles (108). She wants to assert her own identity as a free
woman who can decide for herself. Her decision finds no response either in her life or after
her death; her act is covered with a complete silence and becomes one of the villages taboos
since Its the first time anything like that has happened in the village since God created
(124). After knowing the reasons behind Hosnas act of murder, the narrator starts revising
his ideas towards his village and people. They are no longer the people we recall from the
early pages of the narrative, but a mad folk: Hosna wasnt mad, the narrator says, She
was the sanest woman in the village its you whore mad (132).
Immediately after this discovery, the narrator decides to seek revenge from Mustafa
Said. For him, it is Said, who should be blamed for what happened, because he brought with
him the seeds of European violence:
The world has turned suddenly upside down. Love? Love does not do this. This
hatred. I feel hatred and seek revenge; my adversary is within and I needs must
confront him. Even so, there is still in my mind a modicum of sense that is aware of
the irony of the situation. I begin from where Mustafa Saeed had left off. Yet he at
least made a choice, while I have chosen nothing. (134)
After the tragic incident, the narrator realises that he has to step back from the space of in-
betweeness and take a position. To do so, he figures out that he needs to confront himself, by
making a journey deep into his self. The secret room of Said is made symbolic of the
narrators dark side of his psyche. Inside Saids dark room, it appears to the narrator that
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Mustafa Said was emerging out of darkness and teasing him with a devilish smile. Moving
towards him with hate in his heart, he discovers that the image of his adversary Said is an
illusion. The image he saw is of himself, not that of Said: It was my adversary Mustafa
Saeed. The face grew a neck, the neck two shoulders and a chest, then a trunk and two legs,
and I found myself standing face to face with myself. This is not Mustafa Saeed its a
picture of me frowning at my face in the mirror (135). This realisation echoes that the
narrator has a dual personality (his personality and that of Said) and embodies dual cultures
(East/West) and two ways of life (traditional/modern). To Muhammed Siddiq, the reflection
of the narrators face in the mirror inside Mustafas room is a typical feature of the double in
literature (85). Siddiq suggests that the novels web of correspondences point out that Said
is indeed the narrators alter ego. He concludes that
The motif of the double is reinforced by Mustafas leaving the key to his private room
to the narrator, making him guardian of his children, and the narrators falling in love
with Mustafas widow Hosna. One stylistic element in particular contributes to this:
throughout the novel not one extended dialogue takes place between Mustafa and the
narrator. They exchange a few sentences here and there, but in the main either one or
the other is alone at the centre of the stage. After Mustafas death the two voices
begin to coalesce until it becomes virtually impossible to tell with certainty which one
is speaking. (87)
Playing the game of forgetting is what the narrator ofSeason conforms to at the end.
After cleaning up the dark space of his psyche, the narrator de