Recommendations from our site
“It frequently appears in lists of the ’10 best Arabic novels.’…The plot centers around a guy called Saeed, a hapless, naïve, Forest Gump-esque character who lives through several momentous events in Palestinian history. He is the kind of person that things always seem to happen to, but who never appears to be in control. It starts, more or less, with the events of 1948, which is the creation of the state of Israel and the expulsion of a large number of Palestinians. Saeed himself is expelled from his home, but through a series of connections (and quite a lot of luck), he manages to find his way back into the country. It’s divided into 44 little segments, all of which are comic vignettes about Saeed and his life. It is very picaresque.” Read more...
The Best 20th-Century Arab Novels
Raphael Cormack, Literary Scholar
