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Chapter 16 - Scheherazade in the Diaspora

Home and the City in Arab Migrant Fiction

from Part III - Application

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 October 2020

By
Jumana Bayeh
Edited by
Christopher Warnes  and
Kim Anderson Sasser
Christopher Warnes
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Kim Anderson Sasser
Affiliation:
Wheaton College, Illinois
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Summary

Building on the extensive literature related to postcolonialism and magical realism, this chapter examines how diaspora writing and magical realism are related. It focuses on alienation, the uncanny and mobility, among other elements, demonstrating that these are elements that unite and are common to both modes of writing. It argues that the case of Arab diaspora writing is particularly and uniquely suited to exploring how these modes are related. A close examination of two novels, The Night Counter by Alia Yunis and The Hakawati by Rabih Alameddine, illustrates how various forms of place, a central and key dimension of diaspora fiction, are refashioned and complicated through these novels’ engagement with and use of magical realism.

Keywords

diasporaArab diaspora literatureThe Night CounterThe HakawatihomeBeirutthe Lebanese Civil WarArab-American writing
Type
Chapter
Information
Magical Realism and Literature , pp. 282 - 299
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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