Born in the first half of the 20th Century, Muhammad Kamal al-Khatib is a Syrian author and independent scholar[1]. Part of the Jeel al-Thawra or the "Revolutionary Generation" of the 1960s, al-Khatib has written novels, short stories, scholarly pieces, and works of criticism. His 1984 novel Just Like a River was first translated into English in 2003[2][3], introducing him for the first time to a non-Arabic reading audience. Seen through the points of view of three main characters (Chief Sergeant Yunis, his adult daughter Dallal, and Yusuf, the man with whom she shares a fraught, perpetually speculative romance), al-Khatib captures the variations of contemporary, 1980s Damascus interpersonal life, set amidst the backdrop of international mobility, apprehension of regional conflict, and nostalgia for the rural in the midst of the metropole.
References[edit]
- ^ Schlote, Christiane (2011). "Street lives, roof lives: Literary transformations of Arab urban spaces after Mahfouz". Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 47 (5): 523–534. doi:10.1080/17449855.2011.614789. S2CID 144015116.
- ^ Al-Khatib, Muhammad Kamil (January 2002). Just Like River. Interlink Publishing Group Incorporated. ISBN 978-1-56656-475-5.
- ^ "Mapping the Syrian Consciousness | al Jadid".
- ^ al-Khatib, Muhammad Kamil, et al. “From ‘Just like a River.’” Callaloo, vol. 32, no. 4, 2009, pp. 1091–93. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/27743110. Accessed 19 Feb. 2024.
- ^ "Book Review: 'Just Like a River'". 12 February 2003.
- ^ http://www.banipal.co.uk/downloads/Banipal-LBF-Arab-Lit-Catalogue.pdf
- ^ https://www.hackwriters.com/justlikeariver.htm
- ^ "JUST LIKE a RIVER | Kirkus Reviews".
- ^ Schlote, Christiane (2011). "Street lives, roof lives: Literary transformations of Arab urban spaces after Mahfouz". Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 47 (5): 523–534. doi:10.1080/17449855.2011.614789. S2CID 144015116.