{"id":20163,"date":"2012-06-09T21:37:21","date_gmt":"2012-06-09T17:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/?p=20163"},"modified":"2012-06-09T21:37:26","modified_gmt":"2012-06-09T17:37:26","slug":"syrian-revolution-diairies-my-most-difficult-read","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/middle-east-society\/syrian-revolution-diairies-my-most-difficult-read\/","title":{"rendered":"Syrian Revolution Diairies: My Most Difficult Read"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I am in the middle of reading Samar Yazbek\u2019s\u00a0A Woman in the Crossfire: Diaries of the Syrian Revolution <\/em>(trans. Max Weiss, available next month), and it is very possibly the most painful book-experience I have ever had. Every few pages, I am so overwhelmed that I need to put the book down and stare out the window.<\/p>\n

I am usually a fairly hardy reader: My husband resented me for giving him Elias Khoury\u2019s award-winning Yalo<\/em> (2000), trans. Humphrey Davies (2009), which unrelentingly explores the nature of \u2014 and relationship between \u2014 torture, violence, and story. I feel a bit cold-hearted to say it, but I appreciate the book\u2019s art. Algerian author Anouar Benmalek\u2019s Abduction<\/em>, trans. Simon Pare\u00a0(2011), is based on a true story. The book piles horror atop horror. But it\u2019s a discussion of horror, a look\u00a0<\/em>at horror.<\/p>\n

Because of the level of craft and shaping in those books, I was able to read them at a critical distance. Even though they discussed (real, and real-seeming) horrors, they also gave me a sort of philosophical\u2026enjoyment, I suppose.<\/p>\n

A Woman in the Crossfire<\/em> is not shaped. This is not because it\u2019s nonfiction: If you read Cairo: My City, Our Revolution<\/em>, you\u2019ll find that Ahdaf Soueif\u2019s revolution diary received careful and thoughtful shaping. Perhaps this is all the shaping Yazbek could manage. Or perhaps it\u2019s her diary\u2019s most fitting form.<\/p>\n

Yes, yes, books about horrors \u2014 let\u2019s say Primo Levi\u2019s\u00a0If This is a Man<\/em> \u2013\u00a0<\/em>can be pleasurable readerly and philosophical experiences. But reading A Woman in the Crossfire<\/em> is not pleasurable in any straightforward way. Or at least not in the first 130 pages.<\/p>\n

I suppose, in many other books of witness, there is a\u00a0pleasure in seeing \u201chow things turned out\u201d and \u201clearning from the experience\u201d and having a catharsis of one\u2019s own.<\/p>\n

But Crossfire<\/em>\u00a0has not \u201cturned out,\u201d of course. It feels like a writer\u2019s thoughtful but hurried diary smuggled out of a situation that\u2019s currently ongoing. It\u2019s not quite news; it\u2019s not quite art. We are listening to witness testimonies along with Yazbek. We hear about a fight with her daughter, about how Yazbek woke up in the middle of the night screaming. We follow her, stumbling, into prison. We follow her, stumbling, back out again.<\/p>\n

Somehow, reading this feels like\u00a0I, too, am now participating.<\/p>\n

Of course, when I write that, it feels ridiculous. \u00a0I am not\u00a0<\/em>participating. \u00a0Perhaps I have learned something (although I already had a pretty strong sense that one should neither give PR assistance to Bashar al-Assad nor sell him fancy shoes or weapons). But mostly, I have shared in some people\u2019s pain. Is there some point to secretly, in my own home, sharing in people\u2019s pain? I don\u2019t know. But once you\u2019ve started, and you\u2019ve found that you care about these people \u2014 these characters, these people \u2014 it\u2019s also difficult to stop.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

M. LYNX-QUALEY: It’s a harrowing experience that feels immediate and real because the events are still ongoing. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":20168,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53,154,483,482,5,317],"tags":[513,378,1745,6284,18291,13247,8481,18330],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20163"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}