by Kenneth Todd Ruiz
Assistant Editor
It should have come as no surprise that a lecture on Arabic-French-Canadian women writers would be a multi-lingual experience.
Professor Elizabeth Dahab utilized English, French and Arabic as she spoke March 27 in the University’s West Dining Room about displaced people and her anthology “Voices in the Desert.”
The anthology, which Dahab assembled and edited, includes poetry and prose by nine women from the Middle East, who now live in Quebec.
With the ongoing invasion of Iraq on the minds of all present, Dahab distributed maps of the Middle East to familiarize the audience with the regional layout and origins of the writers.
“It’s important to put faces to ‘displaced people,’ whether it is by politics or bombs,” she said.
Dahab said she started developing the anthology in 1996 in response to a growing body of literary work being produced by French-Canadians of Middle Eastern origin. She traveled to Canada to track down and meet the authors being considered for inclusion.
Most of the writing was translated from French, and Dahab recited several passages in their original language.
About 20 students and faculty, mostly from the English department, listened patiently through the aurally pleasing French for the English translation that followed.
Like many of the writers, she speaks at least three languages. She discussed how, as a writer, this can pose a creative challenge.
“The choice of language exists,” Dahab said. “Often I am divided over which language I should use.”
Different languages, she said, contain words and ideas better suited to different subjects.
“When I want to write about love, my vocabulary is French,” she said.
Dahab read from her introduction and excerpts from two authors. She closed her eyes and turned to a page at random, a technique she referred to in French colloquial as “diable vert,” or “green devil.”
“When something is well written, you can turn to any page, any sentence and find meaning,” she said.
The presence of the “green devil” could be felt throughout her lecture, as Dahab randomly leapt in and out of topics, between the literature, her history and relevant social and political issues.
The writing in the anthology reflects the unique experiences and perspectives of the writers. Their work provides a window into the psychology of exile, voluntary or otherwise.
Author Abla Faroud wrote of her character Dounia’s husband:
“Locked in his throat, his stories were choking him,” Faroud wrote. “In Canada there was no village square, no ears ready to soak up his words, no eyes to see him, no one to understand his stories. Here everybody works all day, then goes home.”
According to Dahab, these writers are twice removed from the society in which they live. Not only as Arab exiles, but also being part of a French minority among a majority English nation.
“The writing is infused with a melancholy for the homes and places they have left,” Dahab said.
Rubba Nadda, another author, conveyed loss and resentment in her story “Daughter of Palestine.”
“My mamma always had something to prove,” Nadda wrote. “Three of her kids died in her arms. My daughters, they dress in their jeans and talk to me in fancy English. They don’t know I shake with anger inside. My curses, my tears they do not hear. I muffle with a towel in the bathroom.”
The lecture lasted just under an hour, with Dahab signing copies of the book afterward.
“She showed that she knew both cultures she was talking about, in order to bridge the gap between them,” said Jibril Latif, University of La Verne senior.
Sam Hodges, a junior international student, said that although she enjoyed the lecture, it should have been more structured. “I learned more than I knew before, but I would have liked to hear more in-depth about the writers’ backgrounds, the religious issues and the restrictions on Arab women,” Hodges said.
Dahab herself would have been a prime candidate for the anthology.
Born in Cairo, Egypt, she was educated in a Catholic convent and grew up speaking French. She emigrated with her parents from Egypt to Canada as a teenager, settling in the predominately French province of Quebec.
She received her doctoral degree from the Sorbonne in Paris in 1987, and now lives in Southern California, teaches at Cal State Long Beach.
Kenneth Scambray, professor of English, invited Dahab to the school and attended the lecture.
He explained that it was important to bring together the writers of this genre, which have not received much attention.
“An anthology such as this could go a long way in creating a collective voice to empower a people, both culturally and politically,” Scambray said.
