PDF erstellt am:. Major work Kaw b s Bayr t Nightmares of Beirut, 1976), the fragmentary and haunting surrealistic. In works on modern Arabic literature Ghada Samman is often described as an innovative. Cutviewer turn. The reader, as well as Samman's undeniable pre&occupation with paratexts throughout her whole.
User Rating: / 8 Poor Best Written by George N. El-Hage Monday, 16 April 2012 08:47 “All ye who enter here, abandon all hope!” “Beirut has ruined me, that’s all!” “That’s not true,” he replied, “You women all accuse Beirut of ruining you when the truth of the matter is that the seeds of corruption were already deep inside you. All Beirut did was to give them a place to thrive and become visible. It’s given them a climate where they can grow.” “She wondered to herself– if they had allowed my body to experience wholesome, sound relationships in Damascus – would I have lost my way to this extent?” _______________________________________________ In Beirut ‘75, Ghada al-Samman shockingly depicts the tragic lives of fictitious characters who find themselves in Beirut, Lebanon prior to the outbreak of the war. Heralded by many critics as being a work that prophesied the Lebanese civil war, Beirut ‘75 is instead a work that expresses the existential and political views of its author and not the complete reality of the socio-political situation at that critical moment in Lebanese history.
Even though Ghada al-Samman argues that the work is not autobiographical and that she does not profess any particular political stance, the work is permeated with her political views and her own personal life experience. The city of Beirut, torn between the East and the West, can even be viewed as a metaphor for the author herself.
In his book, Ghada al-Samman Without Wings, Ghali Shoukry states that a literary work should not be studied in the context of the author’s life even though the author’s autobiography is one of the vital elements in the creation of the artwork. Once the work has been created, Shoukry contends, the author’s life should remain distant from an analysis of the work itself. While I agree in theory with Shoukry’s position, I believe that since al-Samman has intentionally revealed so much about herself and about Beirut ‘75 in her personal and carefully documented interviews, an autobiographical approach to this work is justified and, at the very least, enlightening. In the first part of this study, I present a summary of relevant autobiographical details on Ghada al-Samman.
In the second part, I show how these details relate specifically to Beirut ‘75. Ghada al-Samman is a successful Arab novelist, journalist, and publisher. She is considered to be one of the most prolific woman writers in Arabic today. Al-Samman is a fiercely independent thinker who refuses to compromise her beliefs even under the most trying circumstances. Although she is a staunch promoter of women’s rights and focuses on gender issues, nevertheless she refuses to be labeled a “feminist author.” She argues, and rightly so, that writing is a constant pursuit after that “golden bird called creativity” and that “there is only one alphabet which is neither masculine nor feminine.” She firmly believes that creativity has no gender.
Nor do the issues that plague the Arab countries whether they be social, political, economic, religious or otherwise. “It is a biological coincidence that I was born a female,” she says, for “I am a mere writer who happens to be a woman. And I cannot write to the tune of a boiling pot.” She demands to be read as an Arab author regardless of her gender: I labor just like any other man, and I am capable of supporting myself and my child just like any other citizen.