A sequence of pain: feminist issues within Laila Al-Othman’s Ṣamt al-Farāshāt [silence of the butterflies]

Abstract

This study discusses how Laila Al-Othman engages with issues to determine the nature of her feminist agenda. The different ways in which her novel, Ṣamt al-Farāshāt [Silence of the Butterflies], addresses several feminist issues, mainly forced marriage, rape and sexual abuse, gender-based physical sexual violence, and enforced silence, are explored. This paper focuses on demonstrating social obstacles and continuous trauma caused by a sequence of pain experienced by Arab females in their patriarchal society. It explores the freedom granted to these women in different aspects of life, including their sexuality within a marriage, even if temporarily. This study argues that the novel reveals a sustained effort to raise the banner of feminism and a strong desire to liberate Arab women from patriarchal domination. Al-Othman successfully and uniquely represents women as victims of gender-based traumatic sexual and physical violence, forced silence, and general oppression in patriarchal Arab society, who need help, support, protection, and liberation. They are not represented as independent or free. Methodologically, it employs a qualitative literary analysis in addition to trauma theory psychoanalysis, concentrating on feminist issues highlighted in the novel. The narrative techniques are not a focus of this study.

IMPACT STATEMENT

Laila Al-Othman, a prominent Kuwaiti woman writer, used her novel to depict the types of torment and suffering that Arab women continue to face today. The novel advocates for women’s freedoms and rights within Arab society. This study highlights several significant issues of modern feminism, such as the suppression of Arab women, which deprives them of the freedom to choose a life partner, the freedom to move and travel alone, and the freedom to educate themselves. The novel provides an actual example of a woman who perseveres and does not give in to social oppression, but rather fights with all her strength to achieve freedom and renewed hope in the face of despair.

Keywords:

• Ṣamt al-Farāshāt
• Al-Othman
• literary feminism
• sequence of traumatic pain

REVIEWING EDITOR:

• Komalsingh Rambaree, Social Work and Criminology, University of Gävle, Gävle, Sweden

SUBJECTS:

• Feminist Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Education – Social Sciences
• Gender Studies - Soc Sci
• Sociology & Social Policy
• Literature

Introduction

Laila Al-Othman is a feminist writer well-known in Kuwait and the Arab world. She was born in 1943 in Kuwait to a large and wealthy family, and has written several short stories and novels, such as The Woman and the Cat (1985) and Wasumayya Comes out of the Sea (1986). The latter was chosen as one of the 100 best Arab novels of the 21st century. Another prominent Al-Othman novel is Ṣamt al-Farāshāt [Silence of the Butterflies] (2007), which was highly controversial in her native Kuwait upon publication.

Written material explicitly concerning the novel, Silence of the Butterflies, is minimal. In his piece written for the Al-Riyadh newspaper, Al-Muḥsin (2007) analyses the personality of the novel’s female protagonist, portraying her as a role model for Arab women seeking freedom from the difficulties they face in the male-dominated Arab society.

In her study, “The Concerns of Arab Women in the Literature of Laila Al-Othman: A Reading in the Two Novels- ‘The Coccyx’ and ‘Silence of the Butterflies’,” Majadly (2011) mainly looked for similarities between Al-Othman’s two novels, “The Coccyx” and “Silence of the Butterflies”. While Majadly covers the subject of sex in the context of these two novels, she fails to address several critical feminist concerns in depth, particularly the issues of body and sex, which dominate the novels. Her study views the culture of silence, which is forced on women by the patriarchal Arab society, as the book’s main social issue. Majadly also delves deeply into the narrative techniques employed in the novel, but her study does not address the traumatic suffering or series of oppressions.

Naamneh and Abu Jaber’s (2017) study posed a relevant question, “What are the issues the writer raises in the novel?” However, they failed to address the issue as they were preoccupied with analyzing the novel’s events as reflecting Arab society as an authoritarian society for women. Thus, they did not discuss feminist themes. Instead, they wrote broadly and superficially about Arab society’s masculinity in the novel.

Hence, the studies that have addressed the novel thus far have focused on the silence and oppression imposed on women, highlighting Arab society’s masculinity and tyranny. However, they have not addressed the feminist issues the novel raises, such as the sequence of pain, including forced marriage, traumatic rape, sexual abuse, gender-based physical and sexual violence, and enforced silence.

Thus, this study closes the research gap by thoroughly examining the feminist themes Laila Al-Othman’s novel depicts—namely, forced marriage, rape, sexual abuse, physical violence, and the extent of the traumatic agony and suffering endured by Arab female victims who rebel against patriarchal society and its stereotypes of women and sex in search of freedom.

This study applied the qualitative literary narrative analysis method and the trauma theory and psychoanalytic approach to focus on topics highlighted in the work and the traumatic suffering Arab females experience in patriarchal societies. Sigmund Freud sees trauma as “a consequence of an extensive breach being made in the protective shield against stimuli …it is caused by lack of any preparedness for anxiety” (as cited in Ayaicha et al., 2022, p. 4). That is, since the victim is unable to process unexpected traumatic events, those events traumatize the victim. Dejonghe defines trauma as “experiencing or witnessing an event involving threat or fear or physical integrity that results in feelings of fear, helplessness, or horror” (as cited in Abubakar, 2017, p. 119). Abubakar maintains that trauma has more psychological effects than physical ones (2017, p. 119).

Furthermore, in this context, Elissa illuminates the link between trauma and literary studies. She states that “literary texts are means through which the nature of trauma is revealed by its witnesses… literature enables us to bear witness to events that cannot be absolutely known and introduces us to experiences that might have otherwise stayed unspoken and unheard” (as cited in Abubakar, 2017, p. 120). Some predominant causes of trauma include rape, sexual abuse, assaults, and physical violence, which are all pivotal events in the studied novel. Thus, examining traumatic events in this study is highly relevant. In this context, scholars maintain that trauma is a common experience in patriarchal societies (Kehinde & Bukola, 2022).

For the reader to grasp the feminist concerns discussed in this study in the context of the novel, a summary of the novel and its sequential occurrences is required.

Nādīah, the novel’s protagonist, is forced by her parents to marry Nāyif, a wealthy older man and her father’s employer. Her father, Moḥsen, is motivated by the desire to keep his job, while her mother, Zaynab, considers Nāyif a source of money and wealth that Nādīah would inherit after his death. After the forced marriage, Nādīah lives in Nāyif’s palace, suffering from injustice, humiliation and oppression, rape, and sexual, psychological, and physical abuse for four years. During this time, her husband forbids her from seeing her family. In the palace, she meets Aṭṭīah, Nāyif’s slave, who deflowers her on her wedding night to make it easier for her husband to sleep with her.

Nādīah manages to escape from the palace after four years, seeks her family’s protection, and tells them about the injustices and the traumatic pain she suffered in her marriage. When Nāyif comes to her family to take her back to his home, they irrevocably refuse after comprehending the torment faced by their daughter in her marriage. Later, upon Nāyif’s death, Nādīah inherits her share of his wealth. As for Aṭṭīah, he becomes free because Nāyif had given him his freedom deed and a sum of money before he passed away. Nādīah buys a new residence, a building where her family lives in one of the apartments. She employs Aṭṭīah as a janitor and later hires him in the trading company her father and brother founded with her money.

Nādīah then enrolls in a university, where she falls in love with Professor Jawād. However, she discovers that he is married and only shows her affection for his sexual gratification. Therefore, she leaves him and rejects his proposal for a temporary marriage. She studies hard and starts working as an Arabic language teacher at a school.

Over time, she comes to love Aṭṭīah. She sees him, despite his servitude, as a symbol of honesty, compassion, and sincerity, qualities she did not see in Jawād, her father, or her mother. Nādīah becomes passionately attached to Aṭṭīah, falling in love with him. However, her brother rejects the relationship and warns her of severe consequences. She tells her family that she wants to marry Aṭṭīah. However, they all oppose her. They warn her against such a step as it would not be socially acceptable and would lead to ostracism. Ultimately, out of his fear of the social consequence, Aṭṭīah refuses to marry Nādīah and leaves her despite his love for her.

Discussion

The novel’s protagonist, Nādīah, seeks to achieve freedom throughout the novel. While this study shows that freedom is the most comprehensive front for the feminist issues raised in the novel, Hilāl (2019) indicates that the project to achieve freedom for repressed Arab women in a patriarchal society is a thematic concern in all of Al-Othman’s story collections and novels.

Moreover, Almatrouk says, “Al-Othman was writing during a time where women were less independent than today and she brings up issues concerning religion and society within the patriarchy of Kuwait” (2019, p 14).

This quest for freedom is also reflected in the novel. Nādīah wants to be free from the domination of her parents, brother, and husband. She also wants to marry the person she loves by choice despite his being enslaved. Nādīah clearly wished to attend university before her marriage to Nāyif and live independently. Nādīah wants to be free from the stereotypical concepts of the authoritarian patriarchal society. She seeks freedom of thought, expression, and choice but confronts a repressive, authoritarian, and violent society. In this context, Al-Muḥsin (2007) says, “We have to understand the concept of freedom that the protagonist beats about…She finds in her slave’s freedom and parity the equivalent to the freedom she lacked in her life”. It must be emphasized here that while the slave, Aṭṭīah, was liberated and eventually became free, Nādīah was still stuck in her dreams of attaining freedom. The author brilliantly highlights this aspect by telling the story using the protagonist’s voice, which was lost for a long time. The story ends with Aṭṭīah’s decision to leave her to abide by the patriarchal social perceptions and mores that forbid uniting a slave and non-slave in marriage. Aṭṭīah did not want to rebel against social class constructs, while Nādīah was ready to rebel to be with her lover. Notably, in this context, the protagonist was trying to rebel against male societal domination but could not win.

Nādīah upends the expected sequence of the master-slave relationship and surprises the recipient. While Aṭṭīah used to serve her in the palace, after she left and became wealthy, she took care of him and loved and forgave him despite him torturing and raping her. As a result, she is portrayed as a romantic idealist and an optimist who is always hopeful. Bin Maḥmūd should reevaluate her interpretation of Nādīah as a victim engaging with the executioner to save her life since she still believes she is a victim seeking peace with the executioner (2022, p. 22). The novel does not portray what Bin Maḥmūd says but instead shows Nādīah’s rationale for her actions. In this context, despite the cumulative trauma Nādīah experiences in the palace, as previously stated, she recovers quickly, confirming that she is a strong character capable of liberating herself from past traumas. No doubt exists that the changed circumstances following her husband’s death aided her recovery, supported by the money and her family’s sympathy. However, that she did not win her rebellion against the patriarchal society does not necessarily mean that she is a “non-rebellious protagonist”, as Azzam claims (2014, p. 97). Clearly, Azzam did not pay attention, for example, to Nādīah’s beatings and insults by her father when she refused to marry Nāyif, especially when she said that her father wanted her to marry Nāyif because he worked for him and was afraid of losing his job if he refused (p. 17). Unlike in this context, Bin Maḥmūd defines Nādīah as an optimist and a dreamer in an imperfect patriarchal society (2022, p. 18).

Integrating the character of an enslaved black person into the studied novel is not coincidental. It is likely that the writer deliberately did so to compare and highlight the continuous sufferings of Arab women. While enslaved people have been liberated, Arab women still seek sexual and social freedom. Interestingly, it seems that the writer was influenced by literary heritage, especially “A Thousand and One Nights”, which highlights the issue of sexual relationships between black slaves and women in the palace. Undoubtedly, the protagonist of the studied novel wanted to rebel against the position of the palace men, such as those depicted in “A Thousand and One Nights”, with respect to the sexual relationship of women with black slaves, “he (Shahzaman) returns to his palace to find his wife lying in his bed, embracing a black slave. He kills both …)” (Shamma, 2017, p. 242).

In this context of women’s loss of freedom in the case of marriage, the society surrounding Nādīah both prevents her from choosing her life partner and forces her into marriage with a man decades older to satisfy her family’s greed. In the same context, her mother, Zaynab, says, “He has a lot of money, tomorrow you will live as a princess” (p. 50) and “OK, tomorrow he will die and you will inherit his money” (p. 50). In this scenario, Nādīah becomes a powerless and helpless victim of trauma because she is forced to marry Nāyif, who is decades her senior, and now lives in his mansion as a prisoner, losing all sense of freedom.

Furthermore, in the context of marriage for wealth, Al-Moḥsen (2007) affirms that in Gulf societies, wealth relations come into contact with women’s weaknesses and strengths, and social hierarchy complements the intertwining of local constraints that make cohesive societies. The novel confirms that the need to connect with wealth interacts with the weaknesses and strengths of both women and men. Nādīah’s marriage to a rich older man affirms the weaknesses of both sexes against the power of wealth. The author wanted to undermine masculinity by demonstrating male weakness toward money, confirming that vulnerability to wealth is unrelated to gender.

Islam forbids parents from forcing a daughter to marry a person against her will. Instead, the parents should consult even their widowed daughter on the matter of her marriage, and she can decide whether to accept or refuse. In this context, Messenger (PBUH) says, “A virgin should not be married until her permission is sought”. They said, “O Messenger of Allah! As she will become shy, what is her permission?” He said, “If she remains silent”. Most scholars have inferred from this hadith that forcing an adult girl to marry someone against her wishes is forbidden, especially if the girl is not competent. Undoubtedly, Nāyif was not appropriate, as he was older than her by tens of years. Nādīah was a traumatized victim due to her forced marriage and four years of living in the palace under oppressive conditions. Due to her victimization, she considers herself dead during her stay in her husband’s palace and when engaging in intercourse. She does not interact with him and is profoundly unhappy. She considers the palace a prison and her life as solitary confinement; she does not establish a relationship with anyone and is not allowed to leave the palace. Thus, she was subjected to continuous trauma during her stay at the palace!

As a victim of trauma, she believes that everyone in the palace stands against her and participates in her torture and humiliation. Furthermore, she pays no heed to any feature of wealth and richness in the palace. They are meaningless when compared to freedom in all senses: freedom of movement, freedom to choose a husband, freedom of sex, freedom of education and work, and anything else Nādīah experiences as absent from her world. Freedom is a pivotal feminist issue around which all other issues raised in the novel revolve.

Despite being a traumatized victim, she refuses to succumb to reality in the palace. On the other hand, we see her insisting on the only solution: escape from the palace to seek refuge with her family. Hence, Nādīah cannot be said to be a socially “non-rebellious protagonist”, as Azzam claims (2014, p. 97).

Immediately after she is free of her husband, Nāyif, we see she seeks love and hope despite being continuously traumatized. This implies that she appears to have recovered from the effects of being a victim in the palace for four years. She deeply describes her emotions and thoughts:

My joy was not confined to freedom, nor to an apartment overlooking the sea as I wished, nor to entering the university and being distinguished by continuous success, nor to new friendships…This is how love touched me in its first step… I had jumped to the third year when the sun of love shone to spread its shadows between me and my teacher, Dr. Jawād. (p. 119)

The protagonist’s rebellious nature is shown by her rejection of the proposals of several men despite her mother’s repeated attempts to convince her to accept. She rejected any marriage not based on a previous relationship between profound acquaintances and mutual love (p. 49). We see how delighted she is when she falls in love with her lecturer, indicating how profound her psychological and sexual happiness is.

When Nādīah discovers that Jawād does not love her sincerely but rather wants her as a girlfriend or a mistress to sleep with him and fulfill his sexual needs outside of marriage or through a temporary marriage—the so-called Marriage for Pleasure—she categorically rejects this idea. She refuses to accompany him alone to his house. She refuses to be the lover of an unfulfilled married man seeking to satisfy his sexual desires and needs. She wants sincere love, not a fleeting sexual desire (pp. 141–142). In this context, Nādīah’s discovery of Jawād’s intentions and goals in their relationship was undoubtedly a psychological shock and disappointment for her, creating a dilemma for her. She must confront an internal conflict. On the one hand, she believes that she is free and has the right to enjoy sex and be happy, even temporarily. On the other hand, she is conscious and aware of her greater right to be a woman her husband loves and does not abandon, and whom he does not marry merely to satisfy his sexual desires. She wants a permanent marriage where she can become a mother to a child she raises and nurtures, and one that will lead her toward motherhood in society. She seeks to educate and influence the next generation. Thus, we see the protagonist rebelling in this situation, both against being the mistress of an unsatisfied married man and accepting a temporary marriage to satisfy her own psychological and sexual needs. She does not follow her emotions but rather her intellect and feminist social principles. Furthermore, she makes this decision despite being a widow, a difficult personal situation for women in patriarchal Arab society. She describes how her mother and society view her as a young wife:

In the eyes of my mother and in the eyes of a harsh society, I am just a young widow exposed to suspicions and gossip…My mother did not have mercy on me. She did not have pity on my heart and did not have pity on my soul… (pp. 123–124)

This statement is another indication that the protagonist is committed to her feminist principles. She does not make emotional decisions. She is a true rebellious feminist.

Unexpectedly, she forgives Aṭṭīah and what he had done to her in the palace. She also falls in love with him to the extent that she wants to marry him. This shift is a rebellion against society and its prevailing social and class concepts. It also shows her optimism, as mentioned above, and continuous hope for the future in spite of her past traumatization. However, her attempts are subverted when her family, especially her brother, opposes the marriage and Aṭṭīah leaves, preventing her from fulfilling her desire and dream of marrying him. Perhaps this plot point is an artistic narrative ploy to resolve the conflict between Nādīah and the surrounding community. Nādīah is unable to fulfill her desire, and the community cannot prevent her from achieving this. Although Aṭṭīah was part of the community, he decided to retreat and flee from this arena of conflict.

Another feminist issue related to marriage in some contexts is sexual and physical violence. The first scene of sexual violence against the protagonist Nādīah is inflicted by Aṭṭīah in her husband’s palace on her wedding night. Nāyif orders him to take Nādīah’s virginity as he cannot, on account of his advanced age. This assault would make it easier for Nāyif to have intercourse with her later.

In a scene describing the first violent sexual act against the protagonist, Nāyif grabs Nādīah’s arms and presses her mouth so that she does not scream, which would reveal his deed to the palace and his family. Subsequently, Aṭṭīah also practices physical violence on Nādīah to prepare her for rape and deflowering. Aṭṭīah was young, so he controlled her body, and Nādīah could not resist him (p. 21). Undoubtedly, the protagonist is subjected to a complex trauma that includes forced marriage, rape, and both sexual and physical brutality! This sequence of events certainly increases her agony and suffering, psychologically and physically.

The narrator reveals another kind of sexual violence practiced by Nāyif, who had sex with his girlfriend in Nādīah’s bedroom. This behavior was meant to insult and ridicule Nādīah. The violence here is not a direct physical assault against Nādīah and her body. It is instead a psychological violence, which targets Nādīah’s psyche and her personality (p. 56).

Additionally, the narrator employs a short story inside the novel to reveal a different kind of sexual violence practiced in her patriarchal Arab society: “incest”. This is what Nādīah’s student, Aisha, was subjected to when her brother raped her while their family was traveling for a week. Her brother rapes, beats, and forces her to wear a veil when she goes to school (pp. 189–190). The protagonist acknowledges that she is not the only traumatized victim of sexual and physical violence in this patriarchal society, and shows the Arab man as a monster looking for nothing but sex, using physical violence. Furthermore, the traumatized victim, in this case, differs from the protagonist in that she surrendered to the existing situation, wore the hijab, remained silent, and did not leave the house, precisely according to the wishes of her brother, who committed the rape. The reader sees Nādīah rebel while living under similar circumstances and eventually leave the palace, as previously mentioned. This comparison demonstrates that in a patriarchal Arab society, females’ responses to sexual and physical violence vary.

Physical violence is portrayed at several points in the novel. Nādīah’s father subjected her to physical violence when she reacted to the news that he wanted her to marry an older man, Nāyif, out of fear of losing his job (pp. 17–18). She was also subjected to physical abuse from Nāyif and Aṭṭīah for nothing more than requesting permission to visit her family. These events illustrate the important aspect of freedom of movement advocated by the feminist movement. Without this freedom, the palace becomes a prison for Nādīah (pp. 25–26).

These events also illustrate that Nāyif’s abuse of Nādīah is intended as more than a reprimand or threat. It is torture and cruelty mixed with humiliation and physical and psychological harm, which amplify the trauma’s effects.

Similarly, her brother also physically abuses Nādīah when he discovers her love affair with Aṭṭīah. In this context, Nādīah narrates that her brother caught her in an elevator outside Aṭṭīah’s apartment, causing her to collapse to the ground. He grabbed her arm, pulled it tight, and asked shocking and intrusive questions. However, Nādīah defended her attitude, claiming he had no right to hit her or control her heart (pp. 253–255).

This scene confirms that violence against women is not confined to fathers and husbands but even extends to brothers. She provides an ingenious depiction of the brutality of the authoritarian patriarchal society against women. Here, we see that the brother is violent. He beats his sister and resorts to force and cruelty on account of her relationship with Aṭṭīah. He is committed to the patriarchal society’s rules that deprive women of their freedom and prohibit relationships with the opposite sex. Private relationships outside marriage are cast as suspicious or forbidden, even when they are not sexual, such as Nādīah’s meetings with Aṭṭīah, which take place at their apartments.

In addition to the abovementioned sexual and physical violence, the novel clearly reflects psychological violence represented by repression and the lack of freedom of speech and freedom to protest as women. For example, the author, in the initial pages, indicates that her silence was due to her throat disease and that she underwent surgery to restore her voice. Thus, the author uses her scientific background as a doctor to purposefully mislead the readers about the intention behind using the word “silence” in the title. However, the sequence of pains and torments faced by women in the novel reveals that the word “silence” refers to women’s silence and how they are compelled and constrained by the domineering male social environment surrounding them.

For example, Nādīah is forced to remain silent in the following instances:

In the palace, her husband, Nāyif, said, “Listen, from now on, you must get used to silence. The secrets of the palace may not be disclosed even from the eye of a needle” (p. 13).

Nāyif: “If these sweet lips say something, I will cut them off” (p. 15).

Her husband presses his palm on her mouth to keep her mute, preventing her from screaming or protesting against his orders for the servant Aṭṭīah to have sex with her later at his convenience. This action represents another kind of silence—that over sexual violence/rape.

Regarding silence in her family’s home, Nādīah says, “When my mother used to disagree with me about a matter, even if it was about me, she pressed her index finger to my lips and said: Shut up and listen to me” (p. 16). Her father used to shout at her and tell her, “Shut up, don’t interfere” (p. 17).

Similarly, Aisha’s brother repressed the rape, forced her to wear a veil, and kept her silent. Nādīah’s husband obliged her to remain silent, not complain, and not leave the house. These restrictions reflect the dominance of an oppressive patriarchal husband over a woman. Similarly, Nādīah’s parents forced her to marry a much older man, remain silent, and accept her fate. Thus, the novel depicts silence as a male strategy for oppressing women and preventing them from protesting and achieving freedom.

Nādīah describes a non-oppressive silence, which differs from the tyranny, authoritarianism, and violence practiced against her and her traumatized student as a patriarchal strategy by the authoritarian male social milieu, as follows:

I created a brightly colored apartment filled with plants, flowers…The silence was akin to the scents of plants, walls, and the breath of brides who had not lost their virginity. (pp. 112–113)

Thus, Nādīah compares the silence imposed upon her in the palace and the silence she experiences now after moving out. The silence leads her to her happy dreams since she now owns an apartment offering freedom and happiness. It is a silence she chooses when she wants dreams of calmness, tranquility, imagination, and happiness. We also note that silence was Nādīah’s refuge from disappointment in her relationship with Jawād after she discovered that he did not love her sincerely but instead only wanted her as a girlfriend to make him happy and satisfy his sexual needs.

That night, she returned to her home. However, when she encountered her mother, despite the pain and disappointment caused by her relationship with Jawād, she decided not to disclose this information to her mother, suspecting that her family would prevent her from continuing her university studies. Only a few months remained until her graduation. Thus, she preferred silence; she did not reveal anything to her family. Silence gave her peace; it was her best strategy to continue facing life in a patriarchal, authoritarian, and cruel society. In Jawād, she faced a man who tried to exploit her affection and feelings only to satisfy his sexual desires, while she loved him, pinned her considerable hopes on him, and wanted to marry him, despite knowing that he was married (pp. 142–143).

Regarding silence, Aisha, one of Nādīah’s students in school, was obligated by her brother to remain silent and not reveal to anyone that he had raped her. The student’s experience is yet another example of the toxic silence imposed on a woman under the threat of being killed by her brother (pp. 190–189).

The butterfly is the title’s second principal component. Nādīah says while speaking to the gardener in the palace, “I began, like a butterfly longing for perfume, to make a friendship with flowers, after I used only to befriend cactus trees” (p. 30).

Here, the protagonist portrays herself as a woman who yearns for freedom of movement, choice, and decision-making to emphasize that she is deprived of all these freedoms. The butterfly has more space than her. In addition, she can only befriend cactus trees, perhaps symbolizing the patience with which she takes refuge in the face of having no alternatives. Simultaneously, she lives with the bitterness of the humiliation she faces in the palace of her cruel and authoritarian husband.

Additionally, Nādīah’s family prevents her from living alone as an unmarried woman. Her father tells her they do not oppose her studying or working but they cannot let her live alone (p. 106).

This example illustrates one form of constraining women’s freedom: forbidding them from living alone, being independent, and living where they want. Thus, the narrative demonstrates the strong social constraints placed on women.

All forms of violence, oppression, rape, sexual and physical abuse, injustice against, and undermining of women, especially widows, contribute to one axis: traumatizing females, obstructing women’s social freedom, and preventing them from making decisions, operating independently, expressing themselves, and protesting.

Sequence of pain

Al-Najdī (2016) has stated that many women’s biographies tend to express pain as the primary and prominent component. However, we can confirm that this expression of pain is not exclusive to this genre. Significantly, we clearly notice this theme in “Silence of the Butterflies”, which is not a biography. In this context, Bin Ramaḍān (2021) confirms that the writer portrays the grievous suffering of women through her distinct short stories that are usually summarized by her depiction of men’s violence against women and the confiscation of their freedom.

This novel describes various forms of recurrent pain. When a particular pain disappears or ends, another one quickly appears, as if we are facing a series of ordeals, confirming their permanence and the torments that Arab women face. The novel highlights different types of pain: Nādīah’s forced marriage to the older Nāyif; her rape by Aṭṭīah on her wedding night; her torment in her aged husband’s house, reflected in her continuous beatings and insults; and her being prevented from going out. Nādīah is also prevented by her family from living alone in an apartment that is far from them, being beaten and insulted by her brother because of her relationship with Aṭṭīah. She endures the failure of her relationship with her professor and the loss of Aisha, her student who was raped and who subsequently commits suicide. All of these pains are traumas, interconnected, related, or intertwined because they are all related to being female. This sequence dominates the narration. The novel confirms the torment and injustice that women suffer, all because of the patriarchal society that hinders women’s freedom.

Ayaicha maintains that individuals react differently to trauma depending on their experiences and personalities (2022, p. 9). As a traumatized person, Aisha commits suicide because “for traumatized people, survival itself can be a crisis because of the haunting presence of the catastrophe” (Zhang & Chen, 2019, p. 286). By dramatic contrast, Nādīah escapes the reality of continuous traumatic pain, resorting to imagination to find her freedom. She imagines sexual scenes to be happy there.

The writer employs Nādīah’s dreams and narrates them to magnify the traumatic physical and sexual violence that befell her while she was in the palace:

I see the old man, like a gray mummy, crouching on the couch, grinning through worn-out teeth…Now, I know its true nature, and when it comes to devour my body, it will be harder and more difficult. (pp. 168–169)

In this context, Kehinde and Bukola maintain that “traumatic memories manifest in the form of flashbacks, what is referred to as posttraumatic stress disorder” (2022, p. 20829). Nādīah’s dream is composed of traumatic memories. It reveals the trauma and tragedy of living in the palace with her aged husband. Her subconscious thoughts about her husband and the obedient servant’s “gift” to his sexually and physically violent master, undoubtedly confirm that palace life and the injustice and trauma that Nādīah lived through persisted in her memory.

Here is a description of another of Nādīah’s dreams:

The protagonist opens the door, letting Aṭṭīah come in. He catches her in his arms like a hare being caught by a hungry fox. They feel a need for a black oasis and cling to their broad chest, immersing themselves in its valley between the hills of their bulging breasts. Aṭṭīah caresses the protagonist’s back and neck, causing a shiver of warmth. His palm touches her hair, and they meet. The protagonist’s lips are frightened by his prominent lips, but they are buried in soft pillows, melting with his tempestuous body. He carried her lightly and laid her on the bed. (pp. 204–205)

Thus, the narrator uses Nādīah’s dream, where she enjoys sexual pleasure and activities that she cannot or does not want to practice outside the framework of a permanent marriage based on love. This strategy possibly softens the turbulent and sad atmosphere. It alleviates the intensity of successive traumatic pains. It is a brief, happy interlude during the long ordeal experienced by the narrator and protagonist of the novel.

Nādīah compares two sexual encounters: when Aṭṭīah had sex with her on her old husband’s orders and when he came to her in a dream:

How different is the act of that night and this dream! He was fulfilling a duty there for the master without touching the rose or feeling it. However, tonight, he is a lover preparing the rose to hear her gasp…here on my bed, he left me a burning ember with open pores spreading the incense of her refreshing body, and her eyes go bankrupt in the embrace of her sleep. (p. 206)

We see Nādīah happy with this dream. She confirms that Aṭṭīah’s intercourse with her in the dream differs from when he had sex with her in the palace on Nāyif’s orders. Both involve Nādīah having sex with the same person. However, the contexts are entirely different, causing her to make the comparison. The traumatic actual scene made her sad and brought her pain and misery; the fictional scene in the dream brought her happiness, joy, and sexual vigor.

Interestingly, Nādīah also explains the purpose of these sex dreams:

I stood naked in front of the mirror, contemplating and amazed: Oh, this body… His skin did not sag…The nights became beds of daydreaming …I see myself captured in Aṭṭīah’s arms, staring at his charred face… (p. 210)

She also says:

As much as I enjoyed those images, dreams! I would suffer, I would sigh. I am the beautiful young widow that many wish for and knock on her doors… I find myself diving into Aṭṭīah’s tunnel with all my rays. Choosing him as a secret lover. (pp. 211–212)

In this regard, Al-Arnāʾūṭ states that Laila Al-Othman generally used dreams and legends, both imaginary and real-time, to portray her repressed aspirations in her writings (2013, p. 41). This tendency was also evident in the present study.

Significantly, these imagined sexual scenes and others mentioned in the novel refute Almatrouk’s claims (2019, p. 14) that Al-Othman only addresses the social aspects in her writings without making striking and extensive use of the aspects of sex, body, and women’s freedom related to them.

The protagonist, Nādīah, describes a traumatic sexual scene with Nāyif, linking it to the deprivation of freedom, especially sexual freedom, resulting from being denied the right to choose a husband. She employs sex and its scenes to express the great suffering, pain, and absence of freedom, especially the freedom of sex. When her family forced her to marry a man who was decades older than her, they deprived her of sexual freedom. She was obligated to have sex with the man even though he did not satisfy her sexually.

Nādīah accuses the patriarchal society of depriving her of sexual happiness with her husband. She wanted a marriage based on love, as her mother had when Moḥsen married her (p. 49). Moreover, Nādīah is looking for complete freedom, including in her sexual orientation. In this context, Al-Arnāʾūṭ claims that the essence of Laila Al-Othman’s literature is freedom of choice (2013, p. 32), and the novel attests to this.

Nādīah’s family had prevented her from acquiring an education and working, thus their first step was to marry her to Nāyif, the old man for whom her father used to work. However, her father had agreed that Nādīah would receive an education after her husband died and the legal waiting period (Iddah) was over. He expressed his opinion on approving education or work. However, he refused to let her live alone, far from her family (p. 106).

In this context, Nādīah, as a feminist, did not forget her right to education, even after she was imprisoned in the palace and later when liberated from her husband. Instead, her decision to study at university was her first one after completing the legal waiting period following Nāyif’s death.

Here, Nādīah refers to an issue the global feminist movement has raised continuously: money and the economy constitute primary interfaces for women to achieve equality with men and all rights to a decent life. However, money and wealth did not prevent Nādīah from working, as she was educated and became a teacher in a secondary school. Perhaps the message is a feminist one, urging women not to refrain from or abandon education and work, even if money and wealth are available to them. Education is the most effective weapon for all people to manage life in general. Work has many benefits; for example, when Nādīah is a widow with no child and no companion to comfort or spend time with her.

While Almahasheer sees the sword as a representation of patriarchal inheritance and influence in Fawziyya Abu Khalid’s works (2018, p. 6), we could also consider the previously mentioned residence building that Nādīah purchased as representing patriarchal inheritance and social-economic influence in this context of feminist power.

Conclusion

This research aimed to address the gap in scientific knowledge concerning Laila Al-Othman’s novel, “Silence of the Butterflies”. This study delves deeply into feminist ideas discussed in the novel and the level of misery and suffering experienced by females, particularly those who choose to pursue independence and rebel against a patriarchal society and its conceptions of women and sex. It focuses on the gender-based aspects of female traumatic experiences to highlight the traumatic suffering and sequential pain caused by patriarchal Arab society.

The study used a qualitative narrative literary analysis to explore and discuss the feminist issues raised in the novel and a trauma theory psychoanalysis to investigate the traumatic suffering that females experience. This analysis demonstrates that freedom is the most comprehensive front for the feminist themes highlighted in the literature. Emphasizing that intended freedom embraces all areas of life, such as freedom of movement and travel, freedom to choose a spouse and place of residence, freedom of education and work, freedom of the body, pleasure, and sex, and freedom from all restrictions and concepts of patriarchal Arab society. However, this study shows how the narrator/protagonist, Nādīah, could only gain certain types of freedom, such as work, education, and movement, even if it was under surveillance. At the same time, Aṭṭīah, once enslaved, became a free man. However, in reality, he did not attain complete freedom either since, despite loving Nādīah, he had to refrain from marrying her out of fear of society and its constructs, which prohibit the marriage of a slave to a non-slave. This resolution suggests that Nādīah, the rebellious woman, wanted to marry Aṭṭīah, the slave, but failed despite all her strength, while Aṭṭīah succumbed to the domineering patriarchal system.

By upending the expected sequence of the master-slave relationship and surprising the readers with Nādīah’s reception of Aṭṭīah, the novel shows that Nādīah was a romantic idealist and socially rebellious, and an optimist and dreamer in an imperfect patriarchal society; however, she was not a victim seeking to save her life by making peace with her executioner.

This study revealed several forms of traumatic sexual, physical, and psychological violence that females are subjected to in an authoritarian patriarchal society. While many novels and short stories deal with sexual and physical violence against females outside of marriage, this study discusses the violence they are exposed to inside and outside marriage. We see in this the creativity of the author, who was able to combine, in one novel, several images of traumatic sexual and physical violence that women face both inside and outside marriage. The study also demonstrates that females are subjected to repression and are forced to remain silent rather than protest the concepts and customs imposed upon them in a patriarchal society and the traumatic sexual and physical violence they face. The study also investigated the various reactions of traumatized women to the sexual and physical violence perpetrated against them in a patriarchal society: we see how Aisha committed suicide and how the protagonist insisted on and continues to have new hopes and dreams for freedom and pleasure. The protagonist was optimistic and had a strong personality.

This study shows that writers use realistic descriptions of sexual scenes to portray traumatic sexual violence against women. Some sexual scenes were also intended to demonstrate a woman’s right to obtain pleasure with the one she loves and desires within the framework of marriage, even if it is temporary. The study also explores sexual situations in the narrator’s dreams, using them to highlight a woman’s sadness due to her lack of freedom in this realm.

The study highlights specific passages narrated by Nādīah between episodes of suffering, and those that move from traumatic violence to more extreme violence. It demonstrates that the novel is a sequence of agonies, traumas, and catastrophes that befall women in a male-dominated society. Undoubtedly, the novel illuminates women’s traumatic suffering through the succession of anguishes and torments, caused primarily by their loss of independence in the authoritarian patriarchal Arab society. The analysis shows that repression and the absence of freedom were powerfully present in all stages of the sequence of ordeals. These themes align with the novel’s title, which relates to silence, not of wisdom and thought, but of repression, suppression of free speech, and patriarchal culture’s dominance over women. However, defining the quality of ideal silence requires reading the text and scrutinizing its intricacies. The novel’s title is thought-provoking and romantic but does not reveal its content.

On the other hand, the author is inventive in highlighting women’s ability to confront and challenge obstacles despite these traumatic experiences. The heroine did not give up at any stage. Instead, she set a goal for herself and saw new hope and challenges ahead.

This study has several implications for the field. It contributes to the domain by clarifying and highlighting the feminist concerns and issues raised by Laila Al-Othman, a prominent contemporary feminist woman novelist, in her novel “Silence of the Butterflies”. Additionally, it serves to clarify the traumatic oppression faced by women in the patriarchal Arab society to non-Arab readers. Consequently, the study presents the possibility for further research into the traumatic sexual and physical violence and oppression faced by Arab females.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Khaled Igbaria

Khaled Igbaria received his PhD degree from the University of Edinburgh in 2013, specializing in modern Arabic literature. Khaled is a Lecturer in Arabic at Kaye Academic College of Education and Achva Academic College. Khaled participated in several international conferences on Arabic modern literature and literary feminism.