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Village and Rural life

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While cities are often portrayed as hubs for social change and education (see C: Cities), village and rural life has much been described as the location of conservative traditions, backward beliefs, and stagnation. It is cities from where social and economic policies on village a rural life is created, a fact that results in crisis that is often a topic of literary works. On the other hand, cities are also described as heinous and corrupted places as opposed to the pure and unadulterated countryside. 

  • ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Aswānī (1934 – 2019, Egypt) – Salmā al-Aswāniyyah (‘Salma from Aswan’, 1970). Compares the lives of two women: Nādiyah from Alexandria, and Salmā from Aswan to point to the contrasts of Egyptian city and rural life, and the north and the marginalized south of Egypt (reference). The novel’s protagonist is the young Muṣtafā, who wishes to marry Nādiyah, but, having followed a modern education in Alexandria, is forced to return to his Bedouin village and comply with its code of honour and marry Salmā (reference).
  • Dhū al-Nūn Ayyūb (1908 – 1966, Iraq) – al-Yad, al-Arḍ, wa al-Māʾ (‘Hand, earth and water’, 1948). Depicts the difficult life in an Iraqi agricultural village, deflecting the author’s personal experiences (reference).
  • Zaʿīmah al-Bārūnī’s (1910 – 1976, Libya) short story collection, the first in Libya by a woman, al-Qiṣaṣ al-Qawmī (‘The nationalist stories’, 1958) includes 11 short stories that span historically from before the Islamic conquest of Libya into the late war against Italy (reference). Geographically they cover Libya from Benghazi in the east to Tripoli in the west, from Jebel Nafusa, and to cities in the south such as Ghadames and Fezzan. Thematically, the stories are a depiction of daily and social life in Libya, such as religious life, social activities in the desert, and the relationship between city and the village. Five stories are specifically devoted to women and their essential role in social life.
  • Masʿūdah bint Aḥmad bin Būbakr (1954-, Tunisia) – Wadāʿan Ḥamūrābī (‘Farewell, Hammurabi’, 2003). This novel is set in a remote village in the north of Tunisia, where the villagers are heavily preoccupied with discussing the blockade of Iraq and Operation Desert Strom. While some hypothesize about what is going on in that blood-soaked land, others suggest Iraqis should be armed by Russia. One of the townspeople wants to set up a newspaper with the money he will earn from selling his land, but his father objects. The novel is a depiction of the art of talking in a rural village.
  • Marzāk Baqṭāshi (1945 – 2021, Algeria) – ʿAzzūz al-Kabrān (‘Azzouz al-Kabran’, 1989). This novel depicts ʿAzzūz al-Kabrān, the main protagonist, imposing his rule on a whole village. The events and characters have a symbolic value and introduce the author’s theories on the exercise of power (reference). The conservative village sheikh of the mosque and the teacher, for example, disagree with each other, but nevertheless cooperate to rebel against ʿAzzūz, who sees violence as the ultimate means to gain control.
  • ʿAbdul ʿAzīz al-Fārsī (1976 – 2022, Oman) – Tabkī al-Arḍ, Yaḍḥak Zuḥal (2007, English trans. Earth Weeps, Saturn Laughs, 2013). This novel is set in the home village of its hero, Khālid, an Omani government employee who returns to the village from the city, fleeing from a painful love-affair. He is surprised to see the changes in his village towards corruption, religious bigotry, and racial prejudice. He finds companionship with a poet from Saturn, an imaginary friend, with whom he discusses wisdom beyond the earthly world (reference) (also in S: Speculative Fiction: Science Fiction: Outer Space).
Image of Tabkī al-Arḍ, Yaḍḥak Zuḥal generated through DALL·E by Desiree Custers
  • Sulaymān Fayyāḍ (1929 – 2015, Egypt) – Aṣwāt (1972, English trans. Voices, 1993). Tensions arise in an Egyptian village in the Nile delta when Ḥāmid, who became a wealthy real-estate owner in Paris, returns to his impoverished hometown bringing his French wife, the journalist Sīmūn, with him (reference). Ḥamīd had not been in the village since he was a boy, and his family members, who long-waited him, each have their own reaction to the couple: from the mother who worries about her grandchild’s religious upbringing to the brother who flirts with Sīmūn. Sīmūn sees the village from the perspective of the naïve outsider. Some villagers, especially women, are not so keen on her, leading to the novel’s shocking ending (also in L: Love, Lust, and Relationships: Inter-religious and ethnic (romantic) relationships: Between Arabs and Westerners).
  • Fatḥī Ghānim (1924 – 1999, Egypt) – al-Jabal (‘The mountain’, 1957) depicts an investigation into accusations of theft of building material from the site of a proposed model village in Upper Egypt. The investigator discovers that the planned village, even though it provides modern accommodations, would tear the peasants away from the mountain on which they have lived for centuries, and which provides them with a source of livelihood (reference).
  • ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd ibn Hadūqah (1925 – 1996, Algeria) – Rīḥ al-Junūb (‘South Wind’, 1971). A story about a young woman breaking free from her family and social constrains, this novel portrays the 18-year-old Nafīsa who has returned to live in her small village after having studied in Algiers. The local flute-playing sheepherder, Rābiḥ, takes an interest in her, and believing that his love is reciprocated, he enters her room one night only to be met with rejection. Meanwhile, under pressure of a forced marriage, Nafīsa attempts to flee to the city but is bitten by a snake. This novel is the first Algerian novel written in Arabic rather than French (reference).
  • Tawfīk al-Ḥakīm’s (1898 – 1987, Egypt) play al-Ṣafqah (‘The deal’, 1956), centers the theme of land ownership and the exploitation of poor peasant farmers. When a foreign company wants to sell a piece of land in an Egyptian village, the peasants themselves raise the money to buy it. But when the rich Ḥāmid Bīk passes through the town, they believe he will by the land from under them and eventually manage to distract him long enough to themselves buy the land, by having a village girl named Mabrūkah babysitting his son. The play is an example of al-Ḥakīm’s use of the ‘third language’, between fuṣḥā and the Egyptian Arabic dialect (ʿāmiyyah) (reference) (L: Language and Dialects: Dialects: Egyptian dialect).
  • Aḥmad Ḥarb (1951-, Palestine) – Baqāyā (‘The remains’, 1996). This novel tells the story of the descendants of the matriarch Hajjah Mahbūba and other people from the village al-ʿAyn during the historical developments from the time of the British mandate, to the period of the Jordanian dominance and Israeli occupation, until the period immediately following the Oslo Accord (reference). Among the village characters are Mahbūba’s grandchildren, Wadī, a young girl active in the resistance, and Waḥīd, an intellectual who regularly clashed with the Israelis over his inheritance rights, for which he eventually needs to go to court (reference) (also in I: Israel and Palestine: West Bank and Gaza).
  • Yūsuf Idrīs’ (1927 – 1991, Egypt) many novels and stories often take place in the Egyptian countryside. His short story ‘Arkhaṣ Layālī’ (1954, English trans. ‘The Cheapest Nights’ printed in several translated short story collections in 1957, 1989 and 2020) and novel al-Ḥarām (1959, English trans. The Sinners, 1984) are but two examples.

Set in a small town similar to a rural Delta village in Egypt, the short story ‘Arkhaṣ Layālī’, written largely in the Egyptian dialect, tells of the poverty, boredom and purposelessness of the village’s inhabitants. It’s hero, ʿAbd al-Karīm, unable to sleep and looking for a way to kill time, resorts to sleeping with his wife, which in turn leads to numerous children who, together with the other children resulting from boredom, overflow not only the village, but the country (reference) (also in L: Languages and Dialects: Dialects: Egyptian dialect).

 

In al-Ḥarām, the body of a dead new-born baby found on the bank of a canal in a village in Egypt confuses its inhabitants. An investigation is started, leading to the suspicion of seasonal workers, who are a constant subject of abuse and disdain. One of these, ʿAzīza, the mother of the baby, gave birth on the bank of the canal after being a victim of rape. For fear of the scandal, she accidently kills the baby while trying to muffle its screams (reference). The novel “exposes the conventional moral codes of pre-revolutionary Egyptian rural society and its maze of hypocrisy but at the same time humanizes its characters once they come face to face with tragedy”. The novel was made into a 1965 movie (reference)(also in P: Police novels, Thrillers and Crimes: Murder).

  • Al-Bashīr Khurayyif (1917 – 1983, Tunisia) – al-Dijla fī ʿArājīnihā (‘Dates in their clusters’, 1969). This novel is set in the Nefta oasis in Tunis between 1910 and 1930. The story revolves around the deaths of three people, all victims of an unscrupulous character’s scheming and of the miserable conditions of the impoverished southern area (reference) (also in P: Police novels, Thrillers and Crimes: Murder).
  • ʿAbdalʿazīz Mishrī’s (1955 – 2000, Saudi Arabia) two novels al-Wasmiyyah (‘The rainy season’, 1985) and al-Ghuyūm wa Manbat al-Shajār (‘Clouds and plantations of trees’, 1989) deal with the Saudi countryside.

The first novel depicts a Southern Saudi village that depends on the rainy season for its agriculture. It describes the worries of the villagers when the rainy season is late, but also their daily lives as one of the village’s daughters must stay home in anticipation of a suitable groom (reference). It also reflects on new developments in Saudi villages at the beginning of the forties, such as the establishment of schools, the introduction of modern agricultural machines, and imported wheat from Canada.

 

The second novel further elaborates on this latter theme and depicts a villager, Aḥmad, who is forced to migrate to Mecca to work as a taxi driver during the winter (reference). It also depicts the tensions between the traditional life of the village and that of the city, between the younger and older generations, in matters such as education, modern technology, and the arrival of foreign workers.

 
  • ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Munīf (1933 – 2004, Jordan / Saudi Arabia) – al-Nihāyāt (1978, English trans. Endings, 2007). This novel takes place at a time of prolonged drought in the desert, which threatens the existence of a community resulting in conflict between nature and the humans who misuse it. Its hero, ʿAssaf tries to persuade his community not to overhunt or to uphold the privileges of a few at the expense of the many (reference). ʿAssaf eventually dies guiding around a group of sportsmen from the city when he saves a sportsman who he disdains during a sandstorm. The novel ends by his funeral evoking a collective catharsis, releasing the villagers to work together on a dam to secure them against future droughts (also in N: Nature: Drought).
  • Ibrāhīm Naṣrallah (1954-, Jordan / Palestine) – Barārī al-Ḥummā (1985, English trans. Prairies of Fever: A Novel, 1993) this novel portrays the alienation of the exiled teacher Muḥammad Ḥammād, who lives a state of continuous wandering in an isolated village in the feverishly hot empty quarter region of Saudi Arabia. The fever in the title also refers to the mental state of the novel’s hero, who suffers from a nightmarish combination of hallucinations, visions, dreams, and strange occurrences as he searches for his own identity (reference). Muḥammad is confronted with police officers, for example, who claim that he is dead, forcing him to pay his funeral expenses and making him doubt his whole existence (reference) (also in D: Disabilities, Illness, and Disorders: Psychological Disorders: Hallucination and Deliriums).
  • ʿAbd al-Salām al-Sharīḥī (1983-, Yemen) – Dāliyā (‘Dalia’, 2015). This novel describes the difficult lives of women in the remote Yemeni countryside through the story of Dāliyā (reference). It follows Dāliyā’s life as she grows up in the rural area, moves to a city, and then returns to her small village. The novel looks at the ways in which women are oppressed, such as by religion and superstition, while also describing tribal political dynamics in the Yemeni countryside and the phenomenon of chewing Qat (reference) (also in D: Disabilities, Illness, and Disorders: Addiction).
  • ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sharqāwī’s (1920 – 1987, Egypt) – al-Arḍ (1954, English trans. Egyptian Earth, 1962). This novel is set in early 1930s Egypt during the dictatorship of Ṣidqī and describes the attempt by a local landowner to deprive villagers of the water needed for irrigation and to build a new road across the peasant’s land (reference). The villagers of the Delta village try to resist but are by no means united as they quarrel over sharing the available water and compete for the hand of the village beauty. The novel expresses the tensions existent between the villagers’ and the central government and portrays the different village types, including their use of dialect (reference) (also in L: Languages and Dialects: Dialect: Egyptian dialect).
  • Laylā al-ʿUthmān’s (1943-, Kuwait) short story ‘Zahra Tadkhul al-Ḥayy’ (‘Zahra Enters the Quarter’) describes the young Zahra settling in a coastal village in Kuwait where she gains the confidence and even enchants the all the village’s women except for one: Umm Muḥammad. Umm Muḥammad is aware of the danger implicit in Zahra’s settling, and she proves to be right. One by one, Zahra’s relatives are brought in and buy up the villagers’ houses. While this at first this leads to prosperity, it is eventually replaced by Zahra’s threat to drive out all the villagers. The story can be found in the collection Fatḥiyya Takhtār Mawtahā (‘Fathia chooses her death’, 1987).
  • Walad ʿAbd al-Qādir (1941-, Mauritania) – Aḥmad al-Wādī (‘Ahmed al-Wadi’, 1987). After having witnessed the corruption and failure of modern cities and a long stay in the West, the main character of this novel, Aḥmad, returns to a small Wadi where he tries to build an ideal society (reference). But his project fails in the end, because the city invades the valley, and Aḥmad’s dream is shattered, bringing the novel to a dramatic end.
  • Yusuf al-Qaʿīd (1944-, Egypt) – Akhbār ʿIzzbat al-Minaysī (1971, English trans. News from the Meneisi Farm, 1987). Ṣābrīn is found dead in the rural village of al-Ḍahariuah, in Egypt, and a police investigation follows. It turns out that she was raped and impregnated by her master’s son. An abortion followed, but her brother was set to undue the shame she caused and forced her to drink rat poison, leading to her death. The story is set before, during and after the defeat of 1967 (see 1967 al-Naksah), an event which also plays out in the dynamics of the rural village life (also in P: Police novels, Thrillers and Crimes: Murder).
  • Mubārak Rabīʿ (1935-, Morocco) – al-Ṭayyibūn (‘The good-hearted people’, 1971) analyses the nature of Moroccan society in which rural land is in the hands of greedy landowners living far way in the cities (reference). Narrator of this novel Qāsim al-Shāwī, a former teacher and philosophy student who lives in the old part of Rabat with his mother and sister. He describes the tensions between his own points of view and that of his environment through the political and philosophical discussions that take place in his family and at the university.
  • al-Ṭayyib al-Ṣalīḥ (1929 – 2009, Sudan) – Dūmat Wadd Ḥāmid (‘The Doum tree of Wad Hamid’, 1960). In this collection of short stories Ṣalīḥ describes the mythical Sudanese village of Wadd Ḥāmid in all its details, showing the dichotomy between the self and the other, modernity and tradition, and progress and stagnation (reference). An example is ‘Ḍarīḥ al-Rajul al-Rāḥil’, in which a dialogue takes place between a young man who wants to leave the village and an elderly sheikh. The title story of the collection highlights the lack of trust between the ruler and those being ruled, and their mutual stubbornness which inevitably leads to a clash after the government chooses to install a ferry on a part of the Nile close to the Doum tree, which is worshipped by the villagers.
  • Jūrj Sālim (1933 – 1977, Syria) – Fī al-Manfā (‘In exile’, 1962). In search of meaning and salvation, the alienated protagonist of this novel, a teacher, is exiled to a small village in Syria where he eventually faces execution (reference). The novel reflects on spiritual alienations within a place (exile in) rather than exile from a place. Some studies point to the influence Franz Kafka had on Sālim’s writing. Similarities include the hero of the novel being names S., like Kafka’s K., the Kafkaesque town without a name in which the authorities force him to live in and the focus of the novel on sin and guilt (reference). Many of Jūrj Sālim’s works revolve around the theme of village life.

Refrences:

In order of appearance

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  3. EAL, p. 116, 127, 228, 446, 707
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