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Two Novellas by YAE: A Moroccan in New York and Sea Drinkers by Youssouf Amine Elalamy, John Liechty

2009; University of Oklahoma; Volume: 83; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/wlt.2009.0000

1945-8134

I.C. Munro,

Latin American Literature Studies

^1 Q o H ^1 objectively the exulted new Latin American narrative. Mind reading and hagiography can become decidedly low formsof narrative, so Castellanos Moya opts forrelentless forms in all his novels, particularly in this one's dialogue. His "Author's Note" asserts that he has put history (El Salvador in 1944) at the service of his novel, "distort ing itaccording to the requirements of fiction,"and thatopens up end less possibilities. Tirana memoria's concerns ultimately seem less ideo logical than existential, since Caste llanosMoya sidesteps thecustomary views of Latin American political commitment as a sort of martyr dom, and regards thedaily lives that meander through those struggles as a larger endless enigma. The novel's first part fluctuates among five chronological diaries kept by the upper-class Haydee de Aragon, and five symmetrical sub sections titled "Pr?fugos," which relate the frequentlyhilarious tribu lations of two coup conspirators, Clemen, Haydee and Pericles' oldest and dissolute son, and Jimmy,their army captain nephew. The second part flashes forward to a 1973 lunch, when that coda's narrator, a paint er, remembers how he met Peri cles, now seventy-five and hardly changed, likehis country.This part isnecessary, for it letsPericles speak forhimself,without giving voice to his antagonistic dictator, a new twist for this subgenre. The narrative of Haydee's jailed husband (an influ ential diplomat turned journalist) has the thoughtless naivete of her class, but that is due more to her scrupulousness in narrating and reli gious upbringing. The novel ends with Pericles' suicide. If Castellanos Moya concedes to fictionalizing theU.S. role in the events that led to the coup, it is because history would confirm it. He also opts for concentrating on those who are the "collateral dam age" of such upheavals, fullyaware that the greater thedetailing of the rich's frivolities,thegreater thehor ror readers will feel at the deten tions, executions, and torture that take place after a failed coup (the historical referentcould be General Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez, "El Brujo"). Haydee's progression fromnaively apolitical and entitled woman to politically conscious par ticipantmay be another sign of her permanent dependence on Pericles, or of ourselves as we fear we are. This is a remarkable novel devoid of cliches and a model forwhat an authormight do with the represen tationofLatin American politics. Will H. Corral CaliforniaStateUniversity, Sacramento Youssouf Amine E lala my. Two Novel las by YAE: A Moroccan in New York and Sea Drinkers. JohnLiechty, tr. Lanham, Maryland. Lexington. 2008. xvii + 168 pages. $24.95. isbn 978-0739 125-60-5 Two Novellas by YAE appears in Lexington Books' valuable series "AftertheEmpire: The Francophone World and Postcolonial France," which now includes some thirty two critical and creative works in English covering the francophone literary world fromQuebec to the Caribbean. This publication brings together twoworks originally pub lished inFrench by Youssouf Amine Elalamy, known inMorocco as YAE. An extensive introductionbyValerie Orlando, the series editor, places Elalamy among a younger genera tionofMoroccan writers who grew up under theautocratic rule ofKing Hassan II but matured as writers Iforario ('asicllam>s \lo\ a TIRANA MI.MOKIA while the "years of lead" were giv ing way to a more tolerant, cos mopolitan atmosphere, encouraging literaryinnovation like thatofYAE's Tqarqib Ennab (2006), the first narra tivepublished indemotic Moroccan Arabic or darija. The two narratives in this vol ume are also experimental, if in dif ferent ways. A Moroccan inNew York (UnMarocain ?New York, 1998) is a diary-like collection, "as incoherent as the city," in Elalamy's words, of encounters between an eager young Moroccan student on a Fulbright and thestreetsofNew York. The title suggests a solemnity seldom present, as YAE happily eats atMcDonald's, watches soap operas, struggleswith an answering machine, reflects on the femalebreast, visits a Les Brown TV show and a sex club, and tries to buy condoms. Even his occasional musings on theNew World Order seem to channelWoody Allen. The second work, Sea Drinkers (Les clandestins,2000), thoughmore unified, is experimental in typog raphy, narrative, and in itsmetafic tional reflections on narrative per spective. It centers on the drowning IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIMIIIIIIIIIIItlllllllllllllllllllM 64 1 World Literature Today ^^^H deaths of a group ofmigrants head ed forSpain froma small...