Magical realism as a postcolonial narrative mode of resistance in three of ibrahim al-koni`s novels

Abstract

Sömürgecilik sonrası ülkelerde sömürgecilik deneyimleri olan, Afrika Asya ve Latin Amerikalı yazarların çoğu, kurgu eserlerinde bir yazma biçimi olarak büyülü gerçekçiliği (magical realism) kullanır. Bu yazma biçiminde, yazarlar, Otoriter Batı anlatı söyleminin kurallarına meydan okumayı ve zayıflatmayı sağlayan postcolonial deneyimi ifade etmek için hem gerçekçilik hem de büyülü gerçekçilik kullanma avantajına sahiptir. Yazarların gizli, susturulmuş ve bastırılmış sömürge karşıtı tutumlarını ifade edebilecekleri güçlü ve etkili bir anlatı olarak kabul edilir. Bu tezin amacı, Libyalı Tuareg yazarı İbrahim El-Koni'nin romanlarında anlatı biçimi olarak büyülü gerçekçiliği (magical realism) analiz etmektir.

Most post-colonial African writers and writers from Asia and Latin America whose countries had experiences with colonialism, use magical realism as a mode of writing in their works of fiction. In this mode of writing, writers have the advantage of using both realism and magic to express the postcolonial experience that enables them to challenge and undermine the conventions of the domineering Western narrative discourse. It is regarded as a powerful and effective decolonising narrative discourse through which writers can express their hidden, silenced, and suppressed anti-colonial attitudes. This thesis focuses on the Libyan Tuareg writer Ibrahim al-Koni's real reasons and intentions behind his choice of magical realism as the mode of writing in his novels. The dissertation stresses the importance of this technique for al-Koni who sees it as the most suitable, powerful and effective means to achieve Tuareg's inspirations of having a state of their own. Through this mode, he tries to challenge and subvert the domineering Eurocentric narrative discourse which gives a false picture of the non-European and non-western societies. It allows him to express different approaches to reality other than the Western outlook to it. Al-Koni, in his oeuvre always, directly or indirectly, asserts that the Tuareg are historically the aboriginal inhabitants of the North African Sahara and affirms that they have been living there for more than ten thousand years. He, therefore, portrays the desert, the historical paintings on the rocks and in the walls of the caves in Tassili mountains, trying to prove that the Tuareg are an ancient nation that has its own heritage, history, civilisation, which influenced the ancient neighbouring Egyptian civilisation. He tries to send a message saying that although they are the aboriginal inhabitants of the land, they are unfairly, and unjustly marginalised, denigrated and treated as inferior tribes both by most of the Libyan Arabs and the international community as well. The Bleeding of the Stone, The Seven Veils of Seth and Gold Dust, clearly demonstrate the Tuareg's struggle for survival in order to peacefully gain international recognition of their presence and to preserve their culture, and beliefs. In an interview, al-Koni says that his people are victims of the international community and that they should have the right of forming a state of their own like what happened to suppressed minorities in Kosovo, Bosnia, and South Sudan. In Libya, where the Tuareg live, but Arabic is the only recognised language and Islam is the sole religion of the country. For al-Koni, this is a kind of suppression and denial of the Tuareg's language, myths, cultural heritage and identity which he feels that it is his duty to unmask and to resist and subvert the Western mainstream discourse in his fiction. I intend to study the narrative and thematic strategies of the above mentioned three novels which I believe are excellent examples of postcolonial works of peaceful resistance.