Written by A.C.
Picture below: Author with her book
Information:
Author: Isabella Hammad/ Genre: Historical Fiction/ Published: April 9, 2019
Summary (contains spoilers):
Paris, France, the bustling city of love, life, and light, burst with renaissance. Midhat Kamal, amongst others, shuffled into the city with gleaming dreams of becoming a notable professor of medicine. Although his complexion fared a deeper pigmentation and the flour and water mixtures that consumed his side dishes were not fresh baguettes, a lavish laboratory that held his future brought the fortunes of companionship and first loves. “Bonjour,” he said, greeting his French afternoons, his lovely Jeannette, and the Meditterean Sea. Nablus, Palestine cowered in luscious privilege compared to Paris, a landmark tradeoff Midhat had considered if not for the stark gold stopwatch chained to be breastplate, ticking the Eastern European Time Zone, a symbol of his neverending red thread to Nablus.
As all young rose flowers boiled into sweet syrup become dried fragments of thorny bodies, Midhat is no different, the sweet, buttery fragrances of Jeannette and Paris are left behind, and his duty is to his motherland – to leave the land of occupiers and returning to the occupied land. Once in Nablus, Midhat is rushed to fulfill the Arab filial requirements, marriage, children, and retirement before delusional Zionism and British occupations soon make Jericho bombings a Nablus reality. With marriage comes Fatima and the humble inheritance of his father’s clothing shop, and soon Massarra, Taher, Khaled, and Ghada consummate his marriage. Although having built the average life hinted with the aspects of marriage and children, Midhat is not sheltered from the turmoil of Palestine. Like the atomic bomb bursting above the seams of innocent Hiroshima, Zionists dominate Palestinian lives, threatening a cusp to war.
Midhat, a humble Palestinian shop owner, and former French doctor, remembers nothing else but the Quran of his native tongue, Fatima, Massarra, Taher, Khaled, and Ghada, before defending the golden stopwatch on his chest, the perpetual minute hands telling Midhat that Palestine’s time is neverending. After being discharged from warfare injuries, Midhat is met with the warm, red faces of his family, Ghada escapes the occupied dunes of Nablus and delves into Midhat’s loving embrace. His youngest daughter becomes the living embodiment of his fight for Palestine, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
How the Book Relates to the Modern World:
While Midhat’s journey takes and teaches the ever-maturing perspective of young adults soon being full-fledged adults with larger responsibilities, reading The Parisian develops Midhat also as a representation of Palestine’s neverending pledge for freedom. Isabella Hammad’s historical contexts intertwined with romance and slices of life, teach and reveal the greater purpose of international occupations and genocidal conflicts occurring in Palestine. Hammad’s novel creates a humane perspective of the lives that are being abused by these occupations and symbolizes the imperativeness of bystanders to preserve countries such as Palestine from occupation.
Why the Book Should Be Read in Schools:
In current curriculums and historical maps in student textbooks, the history and legacy of Palestine are overshadowed by the occupation of Zionist ideals, which have created the State of Israel. Students are taught to glorify cultural and historical artifacts of Palestine and accredit them to Israel. They are continuously exposed to media and sources that paint Palestine as a terrorist of Israel’s occupation and taught to ostracize the innocent Palestinians suffering from a lack of sovereignty. Allowing students to read Hammad’s The Parisian will enable them to gain a less sugar-coated and biased perspective on Israel’s occupation of Palestine through a humane and touching novel.
Rating:
The Parisian depicts a world so perfectly turned into a dystopian reality while using historical contexts to create a truly page-turning novel to read.
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