Blurring the Line Between Fiction and Reality: A Review of The Yacoubian Building by Alaa al-Aswany Carl Yonker Alaa al-Aswany, an Egyptian dentist and writer living in Cairo, published his first novel ‘Imarat Yacqoubian (The Yacoubian Building) in 2002. A work of modern Arabic fiction, its story traces the lives of the residents of the Yacoubian Building, an apartment building located in downtown Cairo. Set around the time of the First Gulf War, the novel addresses topics and socio-political issues relevant to contemporary Egyptian society including homosexuality, political Islam, terrorism, torture, social inequality, political corruption, and religious hypocrisy. The realism and forthrightness of the novel capture the frustrations and disappointments of the Egyptian people, illuminate government injustice and corruption, and criticize the Islamist program and false religious piety. In addressing Egypt’s challenges and problems, the lines between fiction and reality are often blurred, as Aswany’s portrait of Egyptian life could easily exist in reality. The author’s realism, and fearlessness to criticize national shortcomings, generated both controversy and praise within Egypt when the novel was published and again when it was made into a film. Through the use of Arabic literary reviews, author interviews and writings, this review seeks to contextualize the publication, the controversy it sparked, and the themes of the novel within the milieu that inspired its creation. Publication and Reception After having several of his writings denied publication by the General Egyptian 1 Book Organization (GEBO),1 the Egyptian State publishing house that “alone makes possible proper distribution and extensive reviews of literary fiction in Egypt,” 2 Aswany was discouraged and dejected. He decided to write one last novel, The Yacoubian Building, and attempt to have it published before leaving Egypt for a life in self-imposed exile in New Zealand.3 Upon completing the novel, Aswany shared it with several friends in Egyptian literary circles, including Jalal Amin, Bahaa’ Tahir, and Jamal alGhitani, 4 who read the work and thought highly of it. Jamal al-Ghitani, editor of Egyptian literary magazine Akhbār al-Adab, published the novel in installments, where it received a largely positive reception from the magazine’s readers, notable literary figures, and public intellectuals.5 Following its serialization in Akhbār al-Adab, Aswany received a publishing offer from a private firm in Beirut, but declined out of fear that the novel would not be well received in Egypt if published outside of the country.6 After rejecting the Beirut offer, Aswany received another from a private publishing house in Egypt based in Cairo, which subsequently published the novel’s first edition.7 The first edition of The Yacoubian Building sold out in a matter of weeks, much to the surprise of the author and publisher, 8 and was praised by reviewers and readers alike. Aswany subsequently decided not to emigrate from Egypt and has since gone on to publish several other successful works of fiction in Egypt. Reviewers compared The Yacoubian Building and its author to the famed 1 Rachel Cooke, “The Interview,” The Observer, May 31, 2009, accessed August 25, 2011, Pankaj Mishra, “Where Alaa Aswany is Writing From,” New York Times Magazine, April 27, 2008, accessed June 12, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/magazine/27aswany-t.html. 3 Nashwa al-Hufi, “Alaa al-Aswany: I wrote The Yacoubian Building and I prepared to leave for New Zealand (Arabic),” ash-Sharq al-Awsat, March 22, 2006, accessed August 8, 2011. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid. 7 Rachel Cooke, “The Interview.” 8 Nashwa al-Hufi, “Alaa al-Aswany.” 2 2 Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz and his works Miramar and Midaq Alley. 9 The comparison of The Yacoubian Building to Miramar is apt, as the latter is also a story of the lives of people living together, specifically, the residents of an Alexandrian pension. Set in Nasser’s Egypt, Mahfouz’s characters and their interactions symbolize the sociopolitical state of Egypt at the time.10 Mona el-Ghobashy, a reviewer for the Cairo Times wrote, “It isn’t difficult to see how the [Yacoubian] building is a stand-in for modern Egypt, with its rampant exploitation and inequality between rich and poor.” 11 The symbolic use of characters and settings as commentary on the social injustices in modern Egypt is not the only similarity between the works, as both were subsequently made into feature films. In addition to associating Aswany’s work with that of Mahfouz, The Yacoubian Building was further praised for the quality and depth of its characters, and its boldness in addressing controversial matters. The respected literary critic Dr. Salah Fadl called the novel a work of “fine art” and “one of the most important works of contemporary fiction” in his review in al-Ahram.12 El-Ghobashy noted, “Al-Aswani bathes all his characters with empathy and even affection, extended to even the most revolting among them.”13 Notably, Jamal al-Ghitani, the editor who had serialized the novel, together with nine other Arab critics praised the novel “for daring to break the mold of censorship, and for 9 See Amina el-Bendary, “A House Falls Apart,” review of ‘Imarat Yacqoubian (The Yacquoubian Building), Al-Ahram Online, week of June 13-19, 2002, Al-Ahram Weekly Issue 590, http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2002/590/bo2.htm, accessed May 27, 2011; and, Mona el-Ghobashy, “Dreams Deferred,” Cairo Times, week of June 20-26, 2002, http://www.arabworldbooks.com/Readers2003/articles/aswani2E.html, accessed May 27, 2011. 10 Naguib Mahfouz, Miramar, trans. Fatma Moussa Mahmoud (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 1978) 11 Mona el-Ghobashy, “Dreams Deferred.” 12 Dr. Salah Fadl, “The Yacoubian Building,” al-Ahram, October 7,2002, accessed on June 12, 2011, (Translation from Arabic Mine), http://www.ahram.org.eg/Archive/2002/10/7/WRIT2.HTM. 13 Mona el-Ghobashy, “Dreams Deferred.” 3 tapping into the pulse of modern-day Egypt.”14 Although the novel was widely admired, critics were divided on its overall literary quality and whether its literary quality was an issue of importance at all. Aswany wrote the book in highly readable Arabic, the quality of which situated it between the formality of Modern Standard Arabic and the informality of colloquial Egyptian Arabic. Rajaa` an-Naqaash, in a review for al-Ahram, wrote of “the birth of a new talent in literary fiction” and remarked on the ease of reading the novel due to its style and clarity of expression, which allows the author to make his points without resorting to literary formalities.15 Ghobashy wrote that Aswany “has with this novel proven himself a master at forging complex characters and telling a highly readable, often moving story, no small achievement. But those looking for linguistic artistry or interesting formal structure will be disappointed. The language is thankfully highly readable and precise but not beautiful nor poetic.”16 Like Ghobashy, other critics raised doubts about the literary quality of The Yacoubian Building but withheld or blunted their criticism of Aswany because they agreed with his politics and his critique of Egyptian society and government.17 Aswany responded to his critics that he wrote for ordinary people, not the elite, so that all could read and enjoy his books.18 Furthermore, Aswany himself attributed the success of his novel not to the topics he addressed, but to his belief that it was great 14 Hanadi Al-Samman , “Out of the Closet: Representation of Homosexuals and Lesbians in Modern Arabic Literature,” Journal of Arabic Literature 39 (2008): 282, Footnote 46, accessed June 12, 2011, www.brill.nl.jal. 15 Rajaa’ an-Naqaash, “Alaa al-Aswany: A Talented New Artist,” al-Ahram, August 18, 2002, accessed June 12, 2011, (Translation from Arabic Mine), http://www.ahram.org.eg/Archive/2002/8/18/WRIT1.HTM 16 Mona el-Ghobashy, “Dreams Deferred.” 17 Pankaj Mishra, “Where Alaa Aswany is Writing From.” 18 Ibid. 4 literature that was also highly readable.19 In end, the debate over literary quality is purely academic. The Yacoubian Building was the best selling novel in the Arab world for five years, displaced from the top of the best-sellers list in 2007 by his next novel, Chicago.20 By 2006, The Yacoubian Building was already in its eighth Arabic language edition, “making it one of the bestselling novels in the history of Arabic fiction.”21 The novel has been published in over two-dozen languages and has been made into both a movie and a television series. Produced in Egypt, the movie was the most expensive film ever produced in the Arab world, with a budget of over 3 million dollars, and featured many of the biggest stars of Arab cinema.22 The Separation between Reality and Fiction The realism of The Yacoubian Building is one of its strengths. Many Egyptian reviewers praised Aswany for dealing with controversial topics in Egyptian society, notably political issues such as corruption, torture and the rise of political Islam. As a reader, it is easy to forget that one is reading a work of fiction. The characters are developed and expressed so well that they must have existed in reality; their experiences must have been actual experiences. And, indeed, although the characters may be fictitious, the plausibility of their experience in modern-day Egypt makes the passages frighteningly real. One example provides a clear illustration: The character Taha elShazli, son of the Yacoubian building’s doorkeeper, is denied a position in the Police 19 Al-Jazeera English, “One on One Alaa al-Aswany,” accessed August 12, 2011: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82Mo4aHlTCc. 20 Ibid. 21 Nashwa al-Hufi, “Alaa al-Aswany.” 22 Kate Daniels, “Film Review: The Yacoubian Building (2006): Director Marwan Hamed, 172 mins,” Global Media and Communication 4 (April 2008): 108-109, accessed June 12, 2011. doi:10.1177/1742766507086855. 5 Academy because of his social class. As a result of his rejection, Taha becomes radicalized and involved in the Gamaa Islamiyya’s opposition to the regime. In the final scenes of the book, Taha carries out a jihad operation against the police officer that tortured and sodomized him while he was in custody. Based on what is known historically, this fictitious telling is the highly plausible account of a person involved in the Gamaa’s operations against the Mubarak regime in the early 1990s. It is in this attention to history and style of presentation, where the lines between fiction and reality are blurred, that the most trouble was created for the novelist. Aswany tells a story in the preface of the English edition of Friendly Fire that addresses the controversies he encountered in publishing The Yacoubian Building. The Yacoubian Building was not his only problematic book; several of his prior works were refused publication by GEBO because the subject matter was considered insulting to Egypt. Aswany tells of the time the first film was shown to Egyptian audiences in Alexandria in 1896. He writes of how the audience, seized with excitement and engrossed in the film, forgot that what they were watching was not real, often times panicking when certain images appeared on the screen. The owner of the cinema, seeking to calm his audience, showed them the screen and said, “This is just a piece of cloth, not much different from a bed sheet. The images that you are going to see are reflected on the screen and do not originate within it. In a short while, you are going to see a speeding train. Remember, gentlemen, that this is only an image of a train, and can therefore do you no harm.”23 The point Aswany seeks to make is that there are “some readers of literature” who “make the same confusion between imagination and reality” and, failing to distinguish between the two, cause him and other novelists great 23 Alaa Al Aswany, Friendly Fire (London: Fourth Estate, 2010), vi-vii. 6 suffering.24 To some degree, readers, especially government censors or those who mirror Aswany’s darker characters, can be forgiven the confusion. On the one hand, Aswany believes “that the confusion that occurs in the minds of some between imagination and reality is an indicator of the artist’s excellence … since he has succeeded in making the reader’s make-believe seem true.”25 On the other, Aswany’s politics are known to his readers, who are aware of his advocacy for democratic reforms and his opposition to the now-fallen regime of Hosni Mubarak. Aswany’s political opinion pieces, critical of government corruption, torture and abuses of Egyptian government are published in opposition newspapers like al-Dustour and al-Arabi. His immersion in politics goes even further, as he was a member of the Kefaya movement, which began in 2004 in opposition to political corruption and Gamal Mubarak’s succession to the presidency.26 He minces no words in his criticism of the state of Islam in Egypt, decrying the advancement of the “philistine and intolerant” ‘Bedouin religion’ that is Wahhabi Islam.27 Aswany does not disagree that literature and reality are closely related and perhaps inseparable. He believes that “literature is an art of life. The novel is a life on paper that resembles our daily lives, but which is more profound, significant, and beautiful. It follows that literature is not an isolated art. On the contrary, its matter is life itself and it intersects with the human sciences such as history, sociology, and ethnology.”28 Furthermore, fiction writers are not scholars and, as Aswany says in his novel Friendly Fire, the characters in novels “present us with human truth but do not necessarily represent social 24 Aswany, Friendly Fire, vii-viii. Aswany, Friendly Fire, ix. 26 Pankaj Mishra, “Where Alaa Aswany is Writing From.” 27 Ibid. 28 Aswany, Friendly Fire, ix. 25 7 truth.”29 However, while literature “is not an isolated art,” 30 it is important that a separation be maintained, not solely to maintain creativity and free expression, but to protect authors from political witch-hunts and physical harm. While the political or religious beliefs of the characters may reflect, in part or in whole, the author’s beliefs, this may not always be the case. Thus, while the characters in The Yacoubian Building often reflect his perspective of Egypt, to ascribe all the views expressed in the novel to the author is over-reaching and presumptuous. Yet, in a cultural environment where literature is politicized, Aswany has been forced to defend his fictional works from extremely harsh criticism. The perception that his books insult the country, its leaders, and political Islam causes great controversy in some circles. Themes and Controversy The Yacoubian Building was branded a controversial novel by commentators due to the subjects addressed within its pages, including honest portrayals of a variety of sexual relationships, political corruption and abuse, and the dangers of political Islam. In the novel, al-Aswany portrays an array of sexual relationships: the homosexual relationship between Hatim Rasheed and Abduh, the love affairs of Busayna, and Hagg Azzam’s marriage to his second wife Souad Gaber. The common aspect to these relations is their exploitative nature despite moments of tenderness. The relationship between Hatim, the editor of the French language newspaper Le Caire, and the married Nubian officer Abduh is the “supposedly” shocking and 29 30 Aswany, Friendly Fire, x. Aswany, Friendly Fire, ix. 8 scandalous homosexual relationship. “Supposedly” scandalous because al-Aswany is not the first Arab author to have openly homosexual characters or themes appear in their works. The character Hatim, son of a wealthy Egyptian intellectual father and French mother, had his first homosexual experience as a nine-year-old boy with the family’s Nubian servant.31 Abduh became Hatim’s lover after Hatim seduced, fondled and paid him.32 Hatim maintains his relationship with Abduh, which Abduh tried to end multiple times out of religious guilt. Financial gifts and promises of a well-paying job so that Abduh could support his wife and son, all in exchange for sex, enslaved Abduh to Hatim. Their relationship ends violently as Abduh murders Hatim in a blind rage, sparked by his deep guilt over the death of his son, which he viewed as a personal punishment from God for his homosexual affair. The character Hagg Azzam, filled with sexual energy and longing in his old age, notices a young, attractive woman named Souad Gaber. The inability to control his urges and desires clashes with his conviction of the forbidden nature of sexual relations outside of marriage. After consulting with a Sheikh who advised him that taking more than one wife is accepted in Islam, Hagg Azzam married Souad on the condition that she never become pregnant and that she leave her son in Alexandria. Thus the relationship was solely about fulfilling his selfish desires.33 The exploitative nature of sex is also demonstrated in the actions of Mr. Talal, a Syrian clothes store owner, who would take the young girl Busayna and other girls working for him to his storeroom so he could fondle them and rub against them until he 31 Alaa al-Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, trans. Humphrey Davies (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006), 74-76. 32 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 77. 33 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 48-55. 9 climaxed.34 Following each encounter, Busayna would receive a small payment or gift, a needed source of income so she could help support her family and pay for her university studies. Although the sexual content, particularly the homosexual relationship between Hatim and Abduh, did not elicit much controversy when the novel was published, the 2006 premiere of the movie to a wide audience drew attention to these themes. Following the movies release, Mustafa Bakri, an Egyptian Parliament member and editor of alUsbua’ newspaper, together with 112 members of Parliament, “produced a petition calling for The Yacoubian Building to be banned, or for its ‘profane’ scenes (of sexual debauchery and drinking) to be deleted.”35 Bakri argued, “I am not against freedom of expression, but this abnormal phenomenon should not be presented as natural. Even if it has roots here, it is rejected by society. And by Islam.”36 Critics of the proposal disputed the assertion and argued that the “petition represent[ed] a case of suppressing a film which deals predominantly with political corruption, so as to divert attention away from this ‘problematic’ topic.”37 The petition ultimately failed and the controversial scenes remained in the film. In contrast to the sexual content, what resonated with Egyptian and Arab readers were its treatment of political and social corruption and the rise of Islamism. The theme of corruption and bribery, whether political or social, can be seen in the character of Hagg Azzam. Hagg Azzam desired to become a representative in the People’s Assembly, and approached party apparatchik Kamal el Fouli in the hope of securing both 34 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 45. Kate Daniels, “Film Review: The Yacoubian Building (2006),” 110. 36 Negar Azmi, “Prisoners of Sex,” New York Times Magazine, December 3, 2006, accessed June 12, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/03/magazine/03arabs.html 37 Kate Daniels, “Film Review: The Yacoubian Building (2006),” 110. 10 35 the nomination to represent the Kasr el-Nil district for the Patriotic Party and his election to the People’s Assembly.38 For one million pounds Hagg Azzam buys the nomination and election from el-Fouli, closing their corrupt deal by reciting the Fatiha together.39 The corruption deepens after Azzam’s victory. He is expected to pay 25% of his recently acquired company’s earnings to remain in the Party’s favor,40 particularly in the favor of the “Big Man,” a veiled allusion to President Mubarak.41 Though he protests having to pay such an exorbitant fee, Azzam complies after being threatened by the Big Man in one of the novel’s final scenes. Through this particular story line, al-Aswany touches on the hypocrisy and corruption present in Egyptian politics, powerfully suggesting that the president himself is involved. The impact of political Islam, particularly its radicalized form, is seen in the character of Taha el-Shazli. Taha, the son of the Yacoubian building’s doorkeeper, aspired to become a police officer at a young age. Yet, after putting forth great effort to be accepted into the police academy, his application is denied due to his low social standing.42 Busayna’s words of comfort to Taha encourage him to grasp the reality that “[t]his country does not belong to us, Taha. It belongs to the people who have money.”43 Out of frustration Taha turns to Islam and becomes involved with Islamists at the university he is attending. His increased devotion to Islam is empowering, and his membership to the Gamaa Islamiyya gives him a sense of belonging.44 His increased Islamic anti-government activism does not become violent until he is arrested and 38 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 83. Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 85. 40 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 147-148. 41 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 230. 42 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 58. 43 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 59. 44 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 115. 39 11 tortured by Egyptian security forces after leading a demonstration against the regime. The brutality inflicted creates in Taha a deep desire for revenge and a more militant attitude.45 At the conclusion of the book, Taha is killed while carrying out a jihad operation against the police commander who tortured him. While having no empathy for the Islamists and their empty ideology, Aswany seems to pardon Taha of any guilt, instead blaming corruption, police brutality and the twisted interpretation of Islam for the character’s demise. Conclusion The beauty of Aswany’s The Yacoubian Building is found the simplicity and clarity with which the author addresses issues facing Egypt today. The depth of the characters and the author’s ability to tell a story involving the many interactions of the residents of one building provides the reader with many insights into Egyptian society. These insights are important because they capture and present truths and realities of Egyptian political and religious culture. It is a novel that both educates and entertains, an important read for anyone interested in understanding modern Egypt and the challenges confronting its society. This observation remains true even in the aftermath of Mubarak’s overthrow, which will hopefully provide Egyptians an opportunity to address and right many of these societal injustices. 45 Aswany, The Yacoubian Building, 152-153. 12