The Silence and the Roar edition by Nihad Sirees Literature Fiction eBooks
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With The Silence and the Roar, Nihad Sirees writes a powerful, life-affirming and Kafkaesque novel about a censored writer trying to live a normal life under a Middle Eastern dictatorship, Syria. Fathi, a writer no longer permitted to write, makes his way through a city churned by parades for an unnamed dictator. It is a day stifled by heat and the noise of the chants, a day of people trampled, and of the brutality and bullying of the party faithful. But Fathi presses treacherously against the crowd, attempting just to visit his mother and his girlfriend. The Silence and the Roar (Al Samt wa Al Sakhab) is a personal, urgent, funny and aggrieved novel. It asks what it means to have a conscience, or to laugh, or to endure in a time of the violence, strangeness and roar of tyranny. It is both a true literary achievement and an act of real courage by a brilliant Syrian writer. Nihad Sirees' The Silence and the Roar (Al Samt wa Al Sakhab) is translated from the Arabic by Max Weiss and published by Pushkin Press
The Silence and the Roar edition by Nihad Sirees Literature Fiction eBooks
An interesting short fictional book examining the meaning and possibilities of roar (e.g., sound, propaganda, forced civilian marches) and silence (e.g., repression, stillness, absence, death). Set in Syria, the book unfolds with life under a dictatorship and the web of lies and propaganda (i.e., the roar) spun and woven to elevate the status and position of the leader at the detriment of the people. The protagonist is an author who has been banned from publishing his works and is hence forced into "silence" through manipulation in various ways. I thought of this as a Syrian 1984. Thought provoking book.Product details
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The Silence and the Roar edition by Nihad Sirees Literature Fiction eBooks Reviews
The chief character and first person narrator of this short (40,000 word) novel, Fathi Abd al-Hakim Sheen, is a 31 year old writer who lives in a country that is not named but could well be Syria, the native country of its creator, Nihad Sirees. The country is ruled by a despotic dictator who much enjoys marches and other demonstrations orchestrated in his honor, devoting much of his own time to viewing them, and too much of the time and energy of his people to participating in them. Those not showing sufficient enthusiasm are beaten-up by his henchmen, and people are routinely crushed and trampled underfoot in the course of the marches. Those who step seriously out of line disappear for extended periods, eventually re-emerging bearing unmistakable signs of torture.
The Silence and the Roar was first published in 2004 (in Lebanon, not Syria - Sirees lives as an exile in Egypt), so the 2011 Arab Spring does not feature and the present Civil War in Syria is referred to only in a 2012 afterword written by the author for the English language edition.
The Leader's henchmen are known as Comrades, and in the background there is the Party. Those features, the size and frequency of the marches, the slogans and the obsessive pleasure the Leader takes in being treated as a deity suggest an element of North Korea too. Then again, the fear that a doctor has of being punished for merely treating the injured and reporting on how many die in the marches recalls recent events in Bahrain.
The roar, which Fathi finds close to intolerable, is the roar of the crowd as the weekly marches proceed, relayed and repeated ad nauseam throughout the day and throughout the week by radio and TV. The silence is more nebulous. It could be Fathi's refusal to follow his calling as a writer - "Silence is wisdom when talk is praise for the Leader". "All you have to do is withdraw inside yourself and listen to your own inner voice and forget all about the annoying sounds that constitute the roar." Another silence is that of a cell in which Fathi is briefly detained; and he reflects that there is also the silence of the grave.
Fathi has a girlfriend, a sister and a mother. Each has a part in the story, which extends over a single day, from 8.30am beyond midnight to 2.30am. Understandably, Kafka has been mentioned with reference to the events of Fathi's day; George Orwell's 1984 will also be recalled.
You could read the book simply as a story - discovering along the way, amongst other things, the erotic potential of various ways of getting cool in a stifling apartment. But the book also has potential as a novel of ideas, inviting us as we read to consider various aspects of dictatorship. At mid-point, Sirees briefly pauses his story to discuss the deification of kings and leaders. He quotes Hannah Arendt on the relationship between the leader and the masses - which could lead into a whole field of reading and research. But you are at liberty to simply finish the story and leave that for another day - unless, of course, you are unfortunate enough to be a subject of one of our 21st century despots.
Nihad Sirees is a Syrian author in exile. He writes with eloquence and bravery about the fall of a nation and its people to an authoritarian dictator.
The narrator of the novel, a man named Mr. Fahti, is a writer who has lost his position -- and his authorial voice -- because of his opposition to the regime. While he's famous enough to stay out of the grave, he exists in the country's shrinking marginal spaces -- in between rallies, marches and propaganda. He visits his mother. He spends time with his lover, Lama. He visits his sister. He walks the city. He remembers and imagines. As the crowds roar around him, as the Leader's voice is amplified ad nauseum, Fahti creates his own inner silence through internal dialogue and story making. He battles the roar with that silence.
After several Kafka-esque encounters with the goons who serve the state. Fahti is given a choice -- continue his silence or join the roar of the oppressor. Sirees creates a marvelous character in Fahti -- a man who battles the madness around him through love and laughter.
Key Quotes
"All you have to do is withdraw inside yourself and listen to your own inner voice and forget all about the annoying sounds that constitute the roar."(112)
"Talking to oneself may be a sickness but it can be effective in keeping a person from going insane." (113)
"I believe that love and peace are the right way to confront tyranny." ~ Afterword
Waste of good reading time. ER
A heartbreaking, but beautiful, piece of literature. You see the mind of a dictator and the heart of of his victims laid bare. Truly an amazing read.
This was a very quick read. Interesting plot which could really be applied to many dictatorial regimes around the world.
Choose this book out of a required reading list for a Middle Eastern Politics class and am satisfied with my choice. It is short and sweet and gets the point across which only requiring 154 pages. If looking for a novel to analyze for political commentary, this is a good choice.
An interesting short fictional book examining the meaning and possibilities of roar (e.g., sound, propaganda, forced civilian marches) and silence (e.g., repression, stillness, absence, death). Set in Syria, the book unfolds with life under a dictatorship and the web of lies and propaganda (i.e., the roar) spun and woven to elevate the status and position of the leader at the detriment of the people. The protagonist is an author who has been banned from publishing his works and is hence forced into "silence" through manipulation in various ways. I thought of this as a Syrian 1984. Thought provoking book.
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