This is the book that Michel
Houellebecq should have written instead of Submission.That novel and the author were lambasted by reviewers and commentators for anti-Muslim
content, but clearly these critics had not read the book. Submission was
quite tame and barely mentioned Islam until the last 20 pages. The rest was a
cure for insomnia about obscure French philosophers. Please see my blog post. I can't be too hard on Houellebecq, whom I
respect greatly, please see my post on The Map & the Territory. His friend Stephane Charbonnier was murdered along with 11
others by radical Muslims at the office of the satirical magazine, Charlie
Hebdo, on the day Submission was published. A caricature of Houellebecq was on
the cover of the magazine.
2084, The End of
the World was written by Algerian author, Boualem Sansal, at great risk to his life. He poses the story in a
fictitious country, governed by a fictitious religion, after a fictitious
global holy war and conflagration. The fiction approach reminded me of comments by Jackie St.
Joan at a reading from her book, My Sisters Made of Light, which is about honor
crimes in Pakistan, please see my post. She is a lawyer and former judge, with a focus on family
violence. She did much research in Pakistan about honor crimes against women
and was going to write a non-fiction account of this. She was advised to put
the information in the form of a novel to protect the people she had
interviewed. They told her that their lives would be at great risk if she wrote
a documentary account. So, it seems that to keep his head attached to his
shoulders, Sansal sensibly made his story completely fictitious. Reading
between the lines, it could portray life in many countries today, including his
home Algeria. The rise of Islamic fundamentalism after the assassination of
President Mohamed Boudiaf lead Sansal to begin writing at the age of 50. 2084 won the Grand Prix of the French
Academy in 2016. Sansal won the Prix du Roman Arabe in 2012. However, the prize
was withdrawn because he spoke at the Jerusalem Writers Festival. He has won other
literary prizes in France & Germany.
The story of 2084 occurs in Abistan, a country ruled by a religion based
on the Gkabul, a holy book transmitted to Abi, the Messenger, by Yolah, the
iron fisted God of this religion. The story follows the life of Ati, a poor
soul buffeted by powerful & violent religious forces. He lives a simple
life of poverty, keeping his head down, like most of the population.
Individual thought, non-religious learning, free will and memory are forbidden. Time begins in 2084, the year the Gkabul was written, there is no history before that. Their lives
are heavily leavened with fear of being tagged by neighbors or various moral
authorities for transgressions against Abi and Yolah. This would take one
quickly to a stoning in a stadium. Ati is unaware of most of the things we take
for granted in life, from the concept of freedom to free will. The people are ignorant of any world beyond Abistan, and there might not be one.
The topic of 2084 is grim, but
the prose is often light and satirical, sometimes comical. It was heroic for Sansal
to write it, and it is well worth a read.
