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dennisfischman 's review for:
Season of Migration to the North
by Tayeb Salih
challenging
dark
informative
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I can definitely see why this book is considered a classic of Arabic-language literature. Unfortunately, as with some English-language classics, it has become badly dated.
First, it's responding to Heart of Darkness, which attempts to expose European colonial attitudes but mostly ends up giving them a megaphone; this book does the same. Second, as in L'Étranger, a central character commits a murder and only later comes to grips with what was wrong about doing so. That psychology was unbelievable when Albert Camus relied on it, and it's just as artificial when Tayeb Salih deploys it for his own narrative and philosophical purposes.
Mainly, the book imagines that a string of European women and one Sudanese woman will fall madly in love with a man who uses and abuses them, for no other reason than the fact that he's an exotic beauty. Wretched, even in fiction.
So why did I like it as much as I did? Even in translation, you can tell it is beautifully written. Also, as the introduction by Laila Lalami points out, it exposes the horrible bind that a man educated by the colonial power and living in a post-colonial African country faces. He is not at home anywhere. He is respected but not trusted; partly, that's because his situation reflects that of his whole society, longing for an organic past but struggling with the awareness of how repressive that traditional society could be, longing for a better future but feeling as if its cost would be a great rift with the past.
I am glad I read some Sudanese history before tackling this book, because otherwise, references to various tribes, towns, and agricultural innovations would have passed me by. Even if you haven't done that, it's a short book and well worth reading. Just be prepared for a bitter aftertaste.
First, it's responding to Heart of Darkness, which attempts to expose European colonial attitudes but mostly ends up giving them a megaphone; this book does the same. Second, as in L'Étranger, a central character commits a murder and only later comes to grips with what was wrong about doing so. That psychology was unbelievable when Albert Camus relied on it, and it's just as artificial when Tayeb Salih deploys it for his own narrative and philosophical purposes.
Mainly, the book imagines that a string of European women and one Sudanese woman will fall madly in love with a man who uses and abuses them, for no other reason than the fact that he's an exotic beauty. Wretched, even in fiction.
So why did I like it as much as I did? Even in translation, you can tell it is beautifully written. Also, as the introduction by Laila Lalami points out, it exposes the horrible bind that a man educated by the colonial power and living in a post-colonial African country faces. He is not at home anywhere. He is respected but not trusted; partly, that's because his situation reflects that of his whole society, longing for an organic past but struggling with the awareness of how repressive that traditional society could be, longing for a better future but feeling as if its cost would be a great rift with the past.
I am glad I read some Sudanese history before tackling this book, because otherwise, references to various tribes, towns, and agricultural innovations would have passed me by. Even if you haven't done that, it's a short book and well worth reading. Just be prepared for a bitter aftertaste.