Al-Arqash and the Gypsy Woman

Description

In Al-Arqash and the Gypsy Woman, as in all his novels, Hanna Munayyeh draws us into his magical worlds, which, despite their strangeness, seem remarkably realistic. The novelist speaks of twenty-two forests and black wolves pursued by hunters in these forests, which are, in reality, our Western world, symbolized by the author’s use of the forests.

The word resonated in Al-Arqash’s ears, but our old man, Fikr, paid it no heed. Kind-hearted, he is only suited to kindness. And what does kindness mean? Misplaced compassion… It is judgment, and no one doubts his wisdom or his being the first to hunt the black wolf. This is a great audacity, not only against the wolves but also against the money, against the fortresses they unleash… This is a good gain, and the twenty-two forests are his cities, in their mobilization of spirits to confiscate the black wolves within them.” In this novel, Hanna Mina continues his mission of exposing the rampant corruption in the Arab world through the black wolves who wreak havoc in the twenty-two forests and the hunters’ attempts to uproot them through “mobilization of spirits.” The forests of this novel are teeming with creatures that are both magical and realistic, bound together by relationships of love, truth, lies, doubts, temptations, and betrayals of principles; and its pages are a world of laughter and tears…