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Abstract
Drawing on recent studies of new cosmopolitanisms, this paper explores Arab writers’ use of space as a literary category in post-Mahfouz Arab urban fiction. By tracing conceptualizations of cosmopolitanism in the Middle East and by identifying and comparing the literary transformations of urban social experiences in Ghada Samman’s Beirut ’75 (1995), Muhammad Kamil al-Khatib’s Just Like a River (1984) and Alaa al Aswany’s The Yacoubian Building (2004), and the writers’ attempts to overcome the ambiguous binary between national and cosmopolitan perspectives, this article aims to situate the novels’ main themes of urban violence, class and gender inequality, consumerism and social exclusion within a broader geopolitical framework.
Notes
1. For the engraving, see <http://www.zalce.com/zalce/gran_ciudad.html>.
2. Notable exceptions include Levy; Mehrez; Starr. For explorations of the Arab/Islamic city see Meijer; Çelik; Zubaida.
3. Arabic names (e.g. Ghādah al-Sammān, Muhammad Kāmil al-Khatīb, ‘Alā’ al-Aswānī) and titles will be used without the diacritical signs.
4. For an interesting personal account of translating Just Like a River in the actual spaces (e.g. seaside, cafés and so on) where the novel is set, see Hartman and Barakat.
5. These differences also pertain to the countries’ literatures. For a conceptualization of Syrian literature in comparison to the more established categories of Egyptian and Lebanese literatures, see Kahf. See also Cooke, Dissident Syria.
6. For in situ globalization in Cairo, see Kuppinger.
7. A most recent example of anti-imperial cosmopolitanism is the reliance of the Egyptian April 6 Youth Movement on the strategies of non-violent revolution propagated and taught by the Serbian youth movement Otpor in their Centre for Applied NonViolent Action and Strategies (CANVAS) in Belgrade: <http://www.canvasopedia.org/legacy/index.htm>.
8. In The Cairo Trilogy, Mahfouz focuses on the Abd al-Jawad family and traces the socio-political and cultural conditions in Egypt from 1917 to 1944. It consists of the following three parts: Bayn al-qasrayn (1956; Palace Walk, 1990), Qasr al-shawq (1957; Palace of Desire, 1991) and al-Sukkariyyah (1957; Sugar Street, 1992).
9. The Lebanese civil war erupted in 1975, shortly after Beirut ’75 was published (Vinson n. pag.). For a survey of literary representations of the Lebanese civil war by women writers, see Cooke, War’s Other Voices.
10. The opening scene may also be read as an intertextual precursor of a similar opening scene in Hanan Al-Shaykh’s Only in London (2001), which also begins with the arrival motif, when the four protagonists (albeit in a plane and not in a taxi) are shown caught in heavy turbulence on their flight from Dubai to London (see Schlote 235–47).
11. According to Pauline Homsi Vinson, Samman emphasizes the “vulnerable condition of her characters through her description of the plight of animals” (n. pag.).
12. For an exploration of the effects of urbanization on the actual Barada River which crosses Damascus, see the short film Before Vanishing (2006) by the Syrian film-maker Joude Gorani.
13. For an earlier and very different example of the representation of gendered life in 1940s Damascus, see Ulfat al-Idilbi’s Sabriya: Damascus Bitter Sweet (1997; Dimashq ya basmatal huzn, 1980) about which Kahf writes: “Idilbi’s work evinces nostalgia for the grand old era of an aristocratic Turco-Arab Syria. [ … ] Idilbi’s words are [ … ] thick with the stuff of Damascus [ … ] her words are brocaded fabric” (231). See also Samman’s The Impossible Novel: A Damascene Mosaic (Al-Riwaya al-Mustahila: Foseifosa Dimash, 1997).
14. According to The Jordan Times, “Bashar Assad signed a decree to lift almost five decades of draconian emergency rule [ … ] as a protest movement which has rocked his regime called for more demonstrations”. (“Syrian president” n. pag.).
15. The Yacoubian Building has also been adapted into a star-studded Egyptian movie, directed by Marwan Hamed (2006) and into an Egyptian TV series. See also Mishra.
16. See Ghannam 17–20.
17. See Schlote 235–47.
18. Regarding the role of literature, al Aswany believes that it “does not change the situation – for democracy you must engage in direct political action – but it changes the reader, teaches us to be less judgmental” (qtd in Jaggi n. pag.).