A new book on Syria zeroes in on the impact of absence

In a world weighed down by oppression and injustice, Fawwaz Haddad's rich new character-driven novel chronicles the fate of a homeland ensnared by the corrupt Ba'athist regime

A new book on Syria zeroes in on the impact of absence

Abdul Rahman Mazhar Halloush

last update on 10 Sep 2025

The Dubious Novelist by Syrian author Fawwaz Haddad is a densely woven story of a nation in the iron grip of a dictatorship. Teeming with characters and vivid detail, the novel is about an anonymous writer who vanishes after publishing his novel. It traces the arc of Syrian history, from the tentative political openness of the Damascus Spring to the brutality and turbulence of the years that followed. The phantom novelist may be gone, but their influence has not.

They instil fear among regime-aligned intellectuals and provoke a confrontation filled with questions of identity and belonging. Published by Riad El-Rayyes Books in Beirut, the book does not just recount the tale of a writer’s disappearance; it presents their absence as an act of resistance, transforming it into a literary device that exposes Syrian societal fractures and the hypocrisy of a complicit elite. Stories intersect, accounts clash over the identity of the anonymous writer, and voices oscillate between sharp criticism and excessive praise, while the “dubious” figure remains beyond the text, their absence propelling the plot forward.

Haddad constructs a narrative laden with ambiguity, where every attempt to grasp the ‘truth’ is subject to interpretation and perspective. This postmodernist approach turns the text into a maze of reflections. Central authority gives way to multiplicity, and irony stops being peripheral, in a fragile cultural environment corrupted by the regime’s ideology.

Absence as symbolic

“The absence of the ‘phantom novelist’ is not just an event in the plot,” Haddad told Al Majalla. “It mirrors the state of Syria’s cultural scene. He does not represent himself as much as he symbolises the silenced intellectual, whose absence creates a space for expression and reveals the systematic marginalisation of the genuine intellectual. Absence generates a counter-presence through writing. Just as the phantom’s novels were pursued, so too did the phantom pursue the regime and the elites who sided with it.”

For the phantom, reality becomes “a source of truth” at a time when obscurity and submission prevailed. Writing under dictatorship means that works by the likes of Hani al-Rahib, Saadallah Wannous, and Mamdouh Adwan “continue to resonate.”

The book traces the arc of Syrian history, from the tentative political openness of the Damascus Spring to the brutality and turbulence of the years that followed

The anonymous author releases four novels under false names. No one can identify them, yet attentive readers know that this is the same phantom chronicling Syrian life from French colonialism to the revolution. None escapes his critique. A prominent figure in the Writers' Union tries to trace and eliminate the phantom along with his literary allies, but their efforts fail. No sooner do they attack one novel, another one appears, exposing their hollow patriotism and their agendas. Regime officials and security agents soon join the pursuit.

Haddad looks inside this literary clique, revealing their personal and professional histories, and the dubious means by which they rose through the bureaucratic ranks, with regime-endorsed prose and lacking all moral integrity. The phantom follows them as they remain confounded by his elusiveness.

Safaa is a wounded and sensitive poet who refuses to let her body be used to gain fame, so instead chooses seclusion. She returns to the toxic literary scene only when she resolves to confront it and becomes a thorn in their side. Meeting the phantom writer by chance, she is drawn to his mystery, while he is captivated by her beauty.

Clues in the title

Haddad's choice of titles for the phantom's novels is not arbitrary. Endless Encounter, The Turning Point, Collapse, and Captive Love mirror the condition of the nation, reflect the journeys of the novel's protagonists, and serve as secret messages to those who reach the end. "These titles are not without deceit," said Haddad.

"While they send encrypted signals about Syria's turbulent history, they can carry both intended meanings and unintended associations... For instance, The Turning Point suggests the moment when events begin to shift, marking the onset of collapse. This is followed by Collapse, which signals the loss of control. At times, a writer seeks to imply rather than reduce a title to a mere descriptive label."

Through this absent writer, Haddad exposes the so-called "foggy intellectuals" who relinquished their critical roles and became guardians of authoritarian ideology. In this way, the writer's absence becomes an act of revelation, while presence serves as a disguise. "The official discourse never recognised the revolution," said Haddad. "It portrayed it as a conspiracy… as a war on terrorism, accusing the opposition of treason and sectarianism." Regime-aligned intellectuals "echoed these accusations in their writings, despite the massacres, the prisons, the destruction, and the displacement".

Some of these 'foggy intellectuals' "excelled at shifting allegiances and failed to justify their opportunistic positions," said Haddad. "Their false secularism never constituted a true political or moral rationale but merely served to obscure the scale of the catastrophe. The so-called dubious phantom, however, succeeded in penetrating a dense and complex reality, placing the entire system of repression and corruption under indictment."

In this way, the search for 'the dubious novelist' becomes a quest for lost meaning amidst the din of official slogans. It also becomes a quest for the silenced human being within a devastated cultural sphere. The novel reveals the fraudulence of Syria's Baathist cultural institutions that degenerated into instruments of exclusion, stripping away creativity in favour of a clique of ideological sycophants echoing the voice of power.

Irony and humour

The novel makes effective use of black humour to expose the chasm between official discourse and lived reality. Justice and reason are glaringly absent, and the critical discussions surrounding the phantom's successive novels dissolve into hollow parody, a grim reflection of the cultural discourse's collapse.

The novel makes effective use of black humour to expose the chasm between official discourse and lived reality

As Haddad notes, irony is used to expose, rather than amuse. It lays bare the organised absurdity instilled by the regime at the heart of intellectual life. Haddad said the irony came "from the vast gulf between the proclamations of a decaying totalitarian regime, boasting massive public support, and a reality that is brutal, merciless and bleak," adding: "Naturally, black humour emerged as both a defence mechanism and a tool of attack. I employed it to highlight contradictions through absurd scenes that merge violence with de-politicisation, and official spectacle with daily tragedy."

The author extends his critique to the homeland itself, depicted as an absent entity, suspended between betrayal and submission. Here, 'absence' does not merely apply to the protagonist but extends to a collective conscience held captive by silence. In this context, the unspoken carries more weight. Silence becomes the substance of the narrative, and absence evolves into a sombre prophecy of what is to come.

Bleak recognition

Despair is fused into the fate of characters, who see the regime's longevity as eternal. For them, it is as though time has come to a standstill in Syria, in an unending cycle of futile ambition. One seeks to secure posts and accolades, while another pursues ideas and influence. An informant and security liaison of the Writers' Union continues his dull routine between cafés and offices, seeking only the approval of his superiors. One chases every promising award, securing them through persistence and connections, while an intelligence officer wages a campaign against intellectuals.

Ozan KOSE / AFP — People wave independence-era Syrian flags as they gather at Saadallah al-Jabiri Square after the Friday noon prayer in Aleppo on December 13, 2024.

Such circumstances are well known to Syrians. When the Assad regime collapsed suddenly in December 2024, an event that nobody had forecast, it was as though the winds of fate had blown a new breath into a suffocating reality. For the first time in over half a century, Syrians experienced genuine joy. The book also reflects this. The writing on the wall, one character leaps aboard the "revolutionary ship". Others disappear "like a grain of salt dissolving in water".

As for Safaa and her beloved phantom, Haddad opted for a happy ending, granting them a just fate at last. "Why withhold justice from them when I can bestow it with my pen?" he said. In breaking narrative conventions to determine the destiny of characters newly freed from the prison of dictatorship, he enacted a form of resistance by giving them the right to live and the right to love. "Unlike my previous novels, most of which concluded with open endings, I chose here to partially abandon that pattern," said Haddad. "Endings should not be sealed, especially when entering a time filled with uncertainty and limitless possibilities. I wrote the second ending immediately after the fall of the regime."

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