The Novel (Interlink World Fiction) [Paperback]

Nawal El Saadawi (Author), Omnia Amin (Translator), Rick London (Translator)

Book Description

Series: Interlink World Fiction | Publication Date: November 2008

"[B]eautiful... She writes about the city and sky above it, like a woman deeply in love with the physical world. "The sun shone in Barcelona" she tells us. "Everything blooms in Barcelona in the springtime: the eyes of kittens, the virgins of the east, migrating birds. The sky is transparent blue." As for her depiction of Cairo, you feel as she describes it, "the same heat from thousands of years ago. From the first Pharaoh to the last one." You feel the life of this novel too, of The Novel, of all the great novels. "
--Alan Cheuse on NPR's All Things Considered

"The novel caused tremendous outrage."

So begins Nawal El Saadawi's tenth novel. And indeed, when the famous Egyptian psychiatrist and writer released The Novel in 2005, it was banned all over the Arab world. But the novel inside The Novel is by a young woman--a woman who is only 23 years old, who has "no family, no university degree, no national identity card," whose name does not appear on the "lists of prominent women writers." A woman, that is, whose biography is as unlike Saadawi's own as possible, as if she has stripped herself of all the effects of her own worldly existence to explore something earlier, more elemental, than the political work for which she is so well known.

In following the life of this young, unnamed, woman writer as it intersects with those of a famous writer named Roustum, his wife Carmen, and a poet called Miriam, El Saadawi gives us a deeply felt exploration of the nature of identity, of fame, of writing, and of freedom.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Nawal El Saadawi is the author of Woman at Point Zero, God Dies by the Nile, and The Hidden Face of Eve, and nearly forty other works of fiction, non-fiction, drama, and memoir, which have been translated into more than thirty languages. For over four decades, she has been Egypt's most prominent feminist activist; she has survived prison, death threats, and the government shutdown of her Arab Women's Solidarity Association and magazines she edited. She lived in exile for a number of years, and taught at and received honorary degrees from universities and colleges all over the world.

Product Details

• Paperback: 236 pages
• Publisher: Interlink Publishing Group (November 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566567327
• ISBN-13: 978-1566567329
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,813,419 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Confusing, disjoined and ambiguous I really disliked it!, July 12, 2011

By 

Linda Linguvic (New York City) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Novel (Interlink World Fiction) (Paperback)

This 2005 novel by Egyptian author Nawal El Saadawi was the reading selection of my local bookstore's reading group. Its 236 pages were a fast read but it was so confusing and disjointed that I finished the book without any real understanding of it. The narrator is a 23-year old woman who writes with a light touch. She critiques the government, uses veils as symbolism and keeps her main character nameless. The world she lives in is oppressive and so is her life. She lives in relative poverty with a roommate who keeps herself traditionally veiled. She has love affairs with several men, has a baby which she farms out to a relative and tries to be a writer. I really didn't like this book. Just too much ambiguity for my taste.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Life of a Writer in the Middle East, January 29, 2009

By 

Story Circle Book Reviews - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Novel (Interlink World Fiction) (Paperback)

With a unique approach, Nawal El Saadawi introduces us to the world of a budding young female writer in her latest book, The Novel. The "young woman" is never referred to by name. She is identified as having, "no family, no university degree, no national identity card" and her name does not appear on the "lists of prominent women writers".

In her search for words to put on paper, the "young woman" encounters many artistic people--writers, poets, freedom groups and more. Poverty, adulterous sex, forbidden love, scorn for religious strictures, dirt behind political maneuvering and mingling of the high and low social classes--all are covered here! Most of the people she encounters wish to influence her and impress upon her their own points of view of how to write and what it is to be a writer.

This is a thinking book--you have to pause and ponder what is being said, turn it over a few times in your mind and then continue to the next thought being expressed. Although profound is an often overused word, its use is completely appropriate to describe this book. Indeed, ponder the words, "Your mind is the final shore where your strong feelings anchor." Little gems such as this thought pepper the pages.

Originally released in Arabic in 2005, The Novel was banned all over the Arab world. The story covers many touchy subjects that are taboo in the Muslim world. Reading this book makes you think, makes you question the traditions and lets you see some of the turmoil of what it is like to be a writer under such oppressed conditions as are rife in the Middle East. While the details and subjects covered may seem mild in a European or American culture, the book caused many problems for the author.

by Rhonda Esakov
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women