LITERATURE AND NATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST

ibrahim muhawipointing to the absent meaning, or context, or both. The deictic element, thesignal, is necessary for the secret communion to take place. When Said, theprotagonist in Habibi’s The Pessoptomist, says at the beginning of the novel that,as a result of a donkey having been shot in his place during the events of 1948,his life in Israel was fadlat that poor beast, we understand he wants us to thinkhe is saying he owes his life to (fadlat) the donkey, and that is the way it isinterpreted in the available translation of this novel. But we are also aware thata pun is intended here, and puns serve the purpose of irony very well becausethey too create a gap between a present and an absent meaning. As Redfernnotes, ‘Though often classified with tongue twisters, acrostics and other verbalsports, their [the puns’] natural place lies with metaphor, irony: the veryfoundations of all rhetoric’ (1984: 178). The ironic intention is triggered by theword fadlat, which can also mean remains and excrement; hence what Said sayscould mean that his life in Israel was equivalent to donkey’s excrement, or equallylikely, that he himself became the remains of the donkey – that he assumed thecharacteristics of the donkey – himar, which is used in Arabic with exactly thesame connotations as the word jackass in English. When the irony ignites, allmeanings are present, and the one that was absent before may acquire thegreater significance.Imil Habibi’s satirical novel The Amazing Events Leading to the Disappearanceof the Hapless Said, the Pessoptomist is a much more extended ironic work thanthose we have dealt with so far, and we will not be able to deal with it at lengthhere. What I therefore intend to do is to explore in greater detail, and withreference to it, the major issues we have so far encountered, focusing on phaticcommunion – what is traditionally called ‘identification’ with the character –deixis and reversal, closing the discussion with an analysis of the all-importantproblem of identity for an Israeli Palestinian. 8Habibi’s novel has enjoyed tremendous popularity among Palestinian readersin particular and Arab readers in general. Though published (in three parts)between 1972 and 1974, its popularity has not waned, and it continues to stirdebate. It would be safe to say that it has achieved the status of an Arabic classic.Its popularity, I believe, stems not only from the importance of its subject, whichis the vexed question of Palestinian identity in Israel, but also from thecharacter of its hero, Said, and the humorous manner in which Habibi presentshim. There is probably no communicative strategy more conducive to phaticcommunion than humour, and Habibi captures readers by making them laugh atand with Said. In reading the novel they see a picture which is not necessarilyflattering, but one in which we all see a bit of ourselves. But in laughing at Said,Palestinian readers in particular will also be laughing at themselves and at theimpossibility of their situation. An Arabic proverb says, ‘The worst disaster isthe one that makes you laugh’ (sharr al-baliyyat ma yudhik).— 40 —www.taq.ir