French-Iraqi author Feurat Alani’s novel I Remember Fallujah recently received the prestigious Arab Literature Prize from the Arab World Institute in Paris and the Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation.
The “poignant” novel, as described by the award jury, had been shortlisted along with six other works last summer.
Alani’s captivating work explores the themes of exile and the memories of a country ravaged by war and sectarian conflicts. With remarkable artistry, the profoundly moving story delves into the intricate complexities of a father-son relationship as it traverses the depths of memory loss and recovery between France and Iraq.
In the early 1970s, Rami decides to flee the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and settle in France after obtaining political asylum. He spends his life running away from a past steeped in tragedies and injustice, believing that living in silence and without memory will liberate him of the man he used to be — or at least will not allow fear to take over his soul again.
What Rami has yet to realise is that memory cannot be simply erased; that memory — just like the homeland — is governed by the rules of the heart. By abandoning his memories, he risks losing the very essence of his humanity, for which he left his homeland in the first place.