Son‘allah Ibrahim’s al-Talassus: The politics of modernity in Egypt through the child-narrator’s lens

Abstract

Son‘allah Ibrahim’s al-Talassus (translated as Stealth by Hosam Aboul-Ela, 2009) is a novel about the coming of age of a child through his deeply troubled relationship with his ageing father during the year 1948 when Egypt was still under British colonialism and monarchical rule. It is also the year of the Palestinian Nakba, when the Arabs and the Zionists were fighting in Palestine on the eve of the declaration of the state of Israel. This article focuses on the significance of recounting the events of the novel and this specific period in Egyptian and Arab history through the lens of the child-narrator. In the Arab world, Ibrahim is celebrated for his modernist stylistics and innovative writing devices and techniques. He has developed his novelistic project over more than 40 years through a variety of narrative structures whilst stirring massive debate and extended discussions in relation to his novelistic forms and content. In this context, al-Talassus is read here as an exploration into the complex and undefined emotions of a child who is bearing witness to his father’s demise through poverty and ill-health during a period in Egypt’s history which is perceived as “modern” through the child’s lens. It is the child who maps out for the reader the politics of modernity by chronicling the details of everyday events, routines, conversations, and encounters. The article draws on Henri Lefebvre’s perception of the “quotidian” as a “philosophical concept” in his work Everyday Life in the Modern World, in order to shed some light on the role which this concept plays in the life of Ibrahim’s young protagonist. It also reflects on the Palestinian writer Faisal Darraj’s analysis of Ibrahim’s treatment of historical time as deriving from everyday time, “as if everyday time becomes the master of all Time”.

Keywords:

• Son‘allah Ibrahim
• al-Talassus
• modernity
• Egypt

Notes

1.

2. Samia Gamal was a famous Egyptian actress and belly dancer.

3. Umm Kalthoum was a legendary Egyptian singer.

4. Ibrahim was imprisoned during the period 1959–64 when President Nasser sent many leftists and communists to the Wahat prison.

5. This particular scene recurs in al-Talassus to capture the image of the child and his father in almost exactly the same situation (however, without the presence of the young daughter). See al-Talassus 195–96.

6. In this context the autobiographical elements in these works are pertinent, particularly as Ibrahim sheds light on his relationship with his father in his memoir Yawmiyyat al-Wahat [The Wahat Diary] (97–119).

7. All quotations from Darraj’s book are my translations.