January 27, 2023 20:23
Fatima Atfa (Abu Dhabi)
The novel “The Coward”, written by Sharki Imra and translated by Nafeh Mualla, was the subject of a dialogue session at the “Bahr of Culture” Foundation, in the presence of Sheikha Sheikha bint Muhammad bin Khalid Al Nahyan, and the dialogue was moderated by the novelist Maryam Al-Ghafli.
The events of the novel take place in Hungary, on the banks of the Danube River, and its heroine is a woman troubled by feelings, thoughts and actions that are offensive to her, her husband, and her sterile life.
And the writer gives the key to his work from the beginning: When I got up in the morning, there was on the table a vase of yellow roses, a wristwatch, and a book in French by an unknown author named Lamarck.
From her look at these things, she realizes that she has reached the age of thirty, and these are gifts from her husband on her birthday, and she is without work or children, despite the passage of nine years of her marriage. But she does not like the gifts, because the watch is antique, and she does not know regarding the writer except that he is one of those interested in the issues of creatures from ancient times, and this is another symbol that suggests that she is not a woman from this era, or that her husband sees her in this way during a time full of knowledge, work, great human responsibilities, and building a family Intimate friendly relations.
We follow the events of the novel, and we see that she is a failed woman who did not complete her studies in medicine, and she married an artist who provided her with everything she wanted, and he carved a statue for her that aroused her displeasure and described it as a “cow.” She also describes her husband as “talentless.” He made her naked in front of his friends and acquaintances when they watched This abominable statue in her eyes. And she does nothing but buy and drive aimlessly at a crazy speed, as if she is in a constant state of flight, because she is a coward and goes through fleeting relationships without any value.
She tells her husband that she is going to visit her family, but she abandons the visit and goes off aimlessly, only to discover that the car needs repair. This may also be a symbolic incident that suggests that her entire absurd life needs radical reform.
She fixes the car and goes on to meet a mechanical engineer, whom she had known since school days, and announces to her that he loves her and will marry her, and they both love swimming, and they spend a lot of time in the river. Then he invites her to visit the farm where he will work, but the visit was not successful because she does not like the life of solitude in the countryside, but she discovers the beauty of family life when the agricultural engineer invited them to lunch at his house and she met his wife and children.
And at lunch all the farm workers attended as if they were one social family, and this is another atmosphere with which she did not fit in. After returning home, she appeals to her husband for divorce, but he refuses and tells her: Go and live as long as you wish, but you will return because I will not abandon you nor agree to divorce.
And she goes to her boyfriend and tells him what happened to her with her husband, but he sees her troubled and behaves recklessly in the restaurant, so he pays the account and takes her out, leaving the food, and suggests that they go to the cinema, hoping that she will calm down, but she refuses, then she agrees following a while. And when he stands in line to take the tickets, she leaves him and wanders on her face, then returns and encounters one of the family’s friends and continues her reckless life, and ends the novel while looking at the threads of the carpet over which she drew random lines like her life and says: What I see in front of me now will always remain like this, as it is. Until I get old and die.
The novel suggests many lessons, which the writer leaves open to every reader, and the main and important lesson is building the family, but the city in the West has lost that intimate relationship, and the countryside remains the safe haven, and agricultural life alone is the incubator of the family.
