LITERATURE AND NATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST

amy zalmanThe penultimate chapter of Men in the Sun is marked by the crisis that willunfold within it from the beginning. The apparent contrast of the chapter’stitle, ‘Sun and Shade’, is misleading, since, while the sun is hot, shade will beeven hotter for the characters. The dislocation of language from its everydayassociations signals the displacement between language and action to follow.The men are silent as the truck heads for the second checkpoint:The huge lorry was carrying them along the road, together with their dreams, theirfamilies, their hopes and ambitions, their misery and despair, their strength andweakness, their past and future, as if it were pushing against the immense door to anew, unknown destiny, and all eyes were fixed on the door’s surface as though boundto it by invisible threads. (Kanafani 1995/1994: 6/129)Despite the catalogue of what stands to be lost, the moment offers apotentially hopeful narrative. History, a dimension that encompasses time andspace, seems imminent. If the men can penetrate the closed door of destiny,they will embody its essence and thereby control it with their own movements.Lighting a cigarette as he stops the truck, Abul Khaizuran suggests that they all‘rest a little before we begin the performance again’ (Kanafani 1995/1994: 48/132). The remark is peculiarly inappropriate to the scene. Abu Qais, Assad andMarwan do not feel like performers, and their stage will be an enclosed andisolated space. Abul Khaizuran, in contrast, reveals the degree to which for himbeing is a continuous performance of normality in defence against the moment,ten years earlier, ‘since they took his manhood from him’ (Kanafani 1995/1994:37/109), and after which he has ‘lived that humiliation, day after day and hourafter hour’ (Kanafani 1995/1994: 38/109).Abul Khaizuran enters the compound in a rush, but instead of the brisk interactionhe anticipates, he gets a leisurely greeting. ‘“Aha! Abu Khaizurana!”shouted the official, as he slid the papers to one side with deliberate carelessness,and crossed his arms on the metal desk. “Where have you been all thistime?”’ (Kanafani 1995/1994: 49/135). Having addressed Abul Khaizuran usinga feminine form of his name, the Iraqi official Abu Baqir and his cronies quizAbul Khaizuran about why he was detained in Basra, tell him that his boss, HajRida, has asked after him six times, and suggest that he sit down and have a cupof tea. Abul Khaizuran, increasingly distraught, simply pushes the pen towardsAbu Baqir. Finally, a story emerges – the officials all believe that AbulKhaizuran has spent his days in Basra with a prostitute named Kawkab. ‘“AbuKhaizurana, you devil. Why do not you tell us what you get up to in Basra? Youmake out to us that you are a decent, well-behaved fellow, and then you go toBasra and commit mortal sins with that dancer, Kawkab … Tell us about thisdancer. The Haj knows the whole story and he’s told it to us. Come on.”’(Kanafani 1995/1994: 51/137–8).The other men feminise Abul Khaizuran in ways that extend beyond their— 60 —www.taq.ir