Home, identity, and place in Syrian literature: Maha Hassan’s Drums of Love and Ghassan Jubbaʿi’s Qahwat Al-General
2022; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 7; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/20581831.2022.2058717
ISSN2058-184X
Autores Tópico(s)North African History and Literature
ResumoThis study explores the juncture of home, liminality and counternarrative in contemporary Syrian literature produced after the eruption of the revolution in 2011. As a case study, I examine how Maha Hassan’s Drums of Love and Ghassan Jubbaʿi’s Qahwat Al-General redefine the concept of home through heterotopic and utopic representations of the place. The study demonstrates that in both works a real sense of home proves unattainable. When the protagonists seek a place for themselves in a home that enjoys freedom and justice, the home denies them. Utilising Bakhtin’s notion of polyphony, I investigate how both works represent a multiplicity of oppressed voices in a ‘home’ that imprisons and estranges everyone. Both texts bear global messages, inviting their readers to examine the complexity of the status quo in Syria through subjecting all-encompassing representations of the revolution and resisting oppression to a process of contestation. Finally, I argue that the unattainable sense of home depicted in the novels marks such texts as a part of the enduring legacy of the Syrian revolution and its causes, and thereby they may foreground solidarity among Syrians who continue to suffer the loss of home.
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