Damn The Novel by Amr Muneer Dahab

Damn the novel is a collection of essays that at first glance, aim to criticise the literary art form which is the novel. The author starts by giving reasons as to why he thinks the novel is being heralded as the most important literary form as a foundation for his argument. This collection, admittedly, had me up in arms at first, ready to defend every single novel and novelist I’ve come into contact with. Then again, that is probably what the author intended. Once you read these essays, you find yourself scrolling through (or flipping through) the pages with an incredulous look on your face. At one point, I set down my device and declared Dahab a pompous gentleman who just wants to get his ideas out there. After that, though, I kept reading and realised that while this is a criticism of the novel, it is not the author’s way of completely dismissing it. The point he endeavours to make is that we have elevated the novel so high that for many young readers (and, apparently, in the literary world as well), other art forms are on the brink of death.

According to Dahab, the superior art forms should be essays and poetry although, that may be from a biased point of view since he is a poet. He makes an argument for the essay by giving examples of writers who dabbled in both the essay and the novel. At the start of the book, Dahab uses Tayeb Salih, a renowned Sudanese writer who penned the work of fiction: Season of Migration to the North as well as a collection of essays, articles, and reviews to make his point. Salih’s novel was declared one of the greatest works of fiction of the 20^th century yet he has not been known to have published any other novel after it. According to Dahab, when asked by critics why he stopped writing, Salih responded by saying that he still wrote essays and articles. Interesting, isn’t it that we do not consider everything else ‘writing’ but the novel? The fact that I cannot name a single essay written by Salih but have come across Season of Migration further serves to drive Dahab’s point home.

View Full Post

The further you read his work, the more convinced you are by his argument. Would we be as insulted if the criticism were about essays or short fiction or even poetry ─the jury’s still out on this one: I, for one, would certainly be offended? Why do we hold the novel even that which is not well written, in higher esteem than other literary forms yet said literary forms gained precedence much earlier? One of the essays in this collection is titled ‘Anyone Can Write a Novel’. In this essay, Dahab shares an excerpt from his book O Writers, Be Humble. To paraphrase him, Dahab gives many examples of several renowned writers in the Arab literary world who transitioned from poetry to story-telling such as Al-Nabigha Al-Dhubiani. Dahab’s argument here is that rarely will we find a writer whose niche is the novel transitioning to poetry yet a poet can simply transition to story-telling through the novel. In other words, writing novels is not that special, so why do we treat it as such? According to Dahab, many writers end up with a novel or two to their name simply because they would like to create some buzz around their work. He cites the fact that prizes for novels are becoming more predominant than prizes for other forms of literature.

Dahab then goes on to hit at people who support the novel without any particular reason as to why. Having made it clear that he is a critic of the novel and stating his reasons why throughout the collection of essays, Dahab implies that it does not make sense that there are proponents of the novel, especially those within the literary world (novelists and critics) who have no solid reason as to why they are behind it other than the fact that they’re riding on a trend. To borrow the title of one of the essays, they love the novel for the novel’s sake. Writing this now, I realise that many of us fall within this category. That includes me. How many times have we exasperatedly chastised a friend or companion who stated that they just can’t read novels yet they can comfortably read an anthology of poetry or a collection of essays? How many times have we failed to explain our fierce devotion to novels? On my end they’re too numerous to count; and therein lies Dahab’s point.

The writer further argues that the novel’s popularity stems from its curators’ ability to tell lies (among other things. One essay looks at the correlation between eroticism in novels and their popularity). Liars, he calls them and accomplices, he calls the readers. Dahab implies that novels are more popular than other literary art forms because for a moment, while you read a novel, you have the luxury of getting completely engrossed in it. You find yourself transported into a world other than your own. An alternate reality of sorts that allows you to forget your own. The majority of the other literary art forms are not able to do that for so long a period as a novel can.

As you progress with the book, you realise that Dahab’s argument is not against the novel (even though it takes reading all the essays to realize that); his argument is for other literary art forms. Embrace the poem as you do the novel…elevate the essay as you have done the novel…realize that without all these others, the novel would not be nearly as relevant or as popular as it is now.

That being said, if you’re looking for a fresh set of eyes through which to view literature, this collection of essays does that. If you’re looking for a controversial conversation starter, Damn the Novel is one title you should read.

Damn the Novel is published by AuthorHouse. You can get copy on Amazon.

0 0 votes

Story Rating

0 Comments

Oldest

Newest Most Voted