- Ḥaydar Ḥaydar (1936 – 2023, Syria) – al-Zaman al-Muwaḥḥash (‘A dreary time’, 1973) depicts a group of people moving from Syria’s impoverished countryside to Damascus and shows their disillusion with the city as they move through a maze of “confused religious ideologies, thwarted social aspirations, competing brands of nationalism and simplistic versions of Marxism” (reference). The novel, written through a stream of consciousness narrative, is a reflection on the state of the Arab world, specifically the secular Arab intellectual, after the great defeat of 1967 (also in 1967 al-Naksah: Syria).
- Ulfat ʿUmar al-Idilbī (1912 – 2007, Syria) – Dimashq Yā Baṣmat al-Ḥuzn (1980, English trans. Sabriya: Damascus Bittersweet, 1995). This novel portrays the city of Damascus in the 1920s during the French mandate. It describes the upbringing of its main character, Ṣabriyyah, through the memoires that she left her young niece. The novel shows how Ṣabriyyah’s journey to define herself is intertwined with national awareness in the context revolt against oppressive French imperial power. While the revolt is crushed by French forces, her personal emancipation is limited by restraining patriarchal values and her dominant brother, and ends tragically with her suicide (also in D: Death: Suicide and 1920: Partitioning of the Arab World into mandates).
- Muḥammad Kāmil al-Khaṭīb (?, Syria) – Hākadhaā ka-al-Nahr (1984, English trans. Just Like a River, 2003). Set in the city of Damascus during the Syrian missile crisis in the 1980s, this novel portrays the voices of several characters from one family, including the father, an elderly army sergeant in the Syrian army, his son who studies in Russia, and the rebellious daughter who is a university student. The novel reflects on the sectarian divisions in Syrian society.
- Nabīl al-Mulaḥam (1953-, Syria) – Khammārat Jabrā (‘Jabra’s café’, 2017). In the year 1940, in a small town in Syria, the young nurse Zamarradah cares for a newborn baby after its mother dies giving birth. She takes the baby, who is called Jādd al-Ḥaqq, and leaves for Damascus where she finds a place to stay in a storehouse near a café where she also finds a job as a dancer. Jādd grows up reading writing and is scouted by a newspaper editor. He spends his adult life writing revolutionary editorials from the café, observing the life around him, through which the reader views the developments in the city from the Syrian independence to the revolution of 2011 (reference) (also in O: Occupations, Professions and Hobbies: Writing).
- Muṭāʿ Ṣafadī (1929-2016, Syria) – Jīl al-Qadar (‘Generation of fate’, 1960) this novel reflects on the alienation among students of the University of Damascus in the 1950s (reference). It is narrated by four existential philosophy-students who, on their journey to define themselves, regularly discuss their ideas against the backdrop of the Syrian political turmoil following decolonization, Arab nationalism, and their own, personal liberation from family and class traditions (reference). The novel also describes the developments of the Syrian Baʿth party in the period that it comprises, from 1953 until 1958 (reference) (also in O: Occupations, Professions and Hobbies: University Life: Academics and Students).
- Ghādah al-Sammān (1942-, Syria) – al-Riwāya al-Mustaḥīla: Fusayfasaʾ Dimashqiyyah (‘The impossible novel: Damascene mosaic’, 1997) and Yā Dimashq Wadāʿan (2015, English trans. Farewell Damascus, 2017).
The first of these chronicles Damascene life and society at mid-19th century through the story of a cheerful teenager by the name of Zayn (reference). It contains autobiographical elements and describes the death of her mother during childbirth, the single parenthood of her father, and her family ties to her grandmother, aunts and uncles, and cousins, all of whom visit her old Damascene house (also in F: Children and Family Life: Parent and Child: Father and Child and S: Social Issues and Societal Change: Gender issues).
Yā Dimashq Wadāʿan tells the story the 18-year-old rebellious university student Zayn who lives in Damascus during the period of social and political change in the 1950s and 1960s. Zayn has fallen out of love with the rich young man who she married despite of her family’s protest, except from her father. She divorces him following an abortion, and her bad example in love is used by the older generation of her family to suppress their own children’s freedom in love. Zayn, however, is set to not let the social constrains shape her life and forges a career in writing literature, broadcasting, and studying (reference). The novel also reflects on Zayn’s relationship with her city Damascus (also in I: Ideologies and Political Movements: Feminism: Working Women).
- Rafik Schami (1946-, Syria) – Das Geheimnes des Kalligraphen (2008, English trans. The Calligrapher’s secret, 2011) and Die Dunkle Seite der Liebe (2004, English trans. The Dark Side of Love, 2009), which are both originally written in German.
Set in period between 1931 and 1956, this first novel portrays the life of several main characters and their families in Damascus. One of these is a calligrapher, Hamid Farsi, who faces threats by traditionalists when he tries to modernize the Arabic script through for example introducing modern lexicon (also in O: Occupations, Professions and Hobbies: Arts).
Die Dunkle Seite der Liebe starts in 1969 with the discovery of the body of a murdered Muslim army officer the result of a generation’s old blood feud between the Catholic Mushtaks and the Orthodox Shahins. This feud also makes a relationship impossible between Farid Mushtak and Rana Shahin, whose story is displayed against the backdrop of Syria’s domestic turmoil in mid-twentieth century and a Damascus whose citizens are less and less capable of co-existence.
- Zakariyyā Tāmir’s (1931-, Syria) collection of short stories Dimashq al-Haraʿiq (‘Damascus in flames’, 1973) contains thirty miniatures depicting the surreal and dark sides of Damascene society. Many of the stories describe scenes of violence against women (such as the stories ‘al-Bustān’ and ‘Aqbal al-yawm al-sābiʿa’), but also life under dictatorship (such as ‘Raḥīl ilā al-Baḥr’).
- Samar Yazbak (1970-, Syria) – Rāʾihat al-Qirfah (2008, Cinnamon, 2012). This novel focusses on the relationship between the lonely, childless upper-class Damascene Ḥanān, and her maid ʿĀliyah who lives in the outskirts of the city (reference). While the novel starts with Ḥanān walking in on ʿĀliyah sleeping with her husband, the novel describes their childhood memories together. It also describes the lesbian relationships of the upper-class society, which often takes similar power dynamics of the heterosexual relationship (also in L: Love, Lust and Relationships: LGBTQ: Lesbian relationships)
Refrences:
- Sabry Hafez. 2000. “The Novel, Politics and Islam: Haydar Haydar’s ‘Banquet for Seaweed’.” New Left Review 5, p. 128
- Khalīl Ṣwīlīh. 2017. “Nabīl al-Mulaḥam ‘Karkhānah’ Ismuha al-Waṭan.” www.al-akhbar.com, 10 January 2017, https://al-akhbar.com/Literature_Arts/224519 (last accessed 5 November 2021)
- Roger Allen. 1992. “The Mature Arabic Novel Outside Egypt.” in Modern Arabic Literature. eds. Muhammad Mustafa Badawi. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 193-223, p. 212
- Reem Hussein Harb. 2016. Muta’ Safadi and The Generation of Fate: A Study of an Arab Existentialist. (Masters’ Thesis, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, USA) Retrieved from https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/44030/HARB-THESIS-2016.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y p. 52-53 (last accessed 5 December 2020)
- EAL, p. 686
Haytham Ḥusayn. 2015. “Yā Dimashq Wadāʿan … Ghādah al-Sammān wa Fusayfasāʾ al-Tamarrud” www.aljazeera.net, 10 March 2015 https://www.aljazeera.net/news/cultureandart/2015/3/10/%D9%8A%D8%A7-%D8%AF%D9%85%D8%B4%D9%82-%D9%88%D8%AF%D8%A7%D8%B9%D8%A7-%D8%BA%D8%A7%D8%AF%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B3%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%86-%D9%88%D9%81%D8%B3%D9%8A%D9%81%D8%B3%D8%A7%D8%A1 (last accessed 26 January 2019)
- Anne-Marie McManus. 2014. “The Contemporary Syrian Novel in Translation.” Arab Studies Journal 22(1): 322-333, p. 326