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The World of Kurdish Women's Novels

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Hashem Ahmadzadeh
Hashem Ahmadzadeh*
Affiliation:
University of Exeter
*
[email protected]
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Abstract

The Kurdish novel emerged in 1935 and, towards the end of the twentieth century, established itself as a literary genre with a significant quantity and quality. However, until the last decade of the previous century the Kurdish novel was entirely dominated by Kurdish men and there is no single novel written by a Kurdish woman. During recent years, however, Kurdish women novelists have contributed to the development of this genre. This article aims to assess Kurdish women's novel-writing and, through analyzing and discussing their style and themes, tries to find out their main characteristic generic features. An attempt is made to see if there are thematic and stylistic differences between Kurdish novels written by the women and their male counterparts.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 41 , Issue 5 , December 2008 , pp. 719 - 738
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2008

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References

1 Cited in Sellers, Susan, Language and Sexual Difference: Feminist Writing in France (London, 1991)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, xi.

2 For more information about the rise of the Kurdish novel see Hashem, Ahmadzadeh, Nation and Novel: A Study of Persian and Kurdish Narrative Discourse (Uppsala, 2003)Google Scholar.

3 Feminist literary approaches towards men's and women's texts can be roughly divided into two categories: An approach which believes in differences between male and female language, and an approach which does not believe in such a division. The idea of a special female language, different from male language, has been advocated by some influential feminist literary critics, e.g. Julia Penelope Stanley and Monica Wittig. For an interesting review of different approaches towards the features of women's style and language by feminist literary critics, see Sellers, Language and Sexual Difference. There are some literary critics who reject the idea of a different language of women. The editorial group ‘Feminist Question’ is against the idea of ‘women language’. Among women writers too there are critics who definitively reject the idea of a separate language of women. Mary Eagleton argues that such a distinction is advocated by those literary schools which are represented by men. Mary, Eagleton, ed., Feminist Theory: A Reader (Oxford, 1996), 338Google Scholar. Eagleton, alongside many other Anglo-Saxon critics, emphasizes the significant role of social, political, and economic relations in providing the possibility of writing for both men and women. According to the followers of this theory “[o]nce the social and cultural restrains on women have been lifted, women will be as autonomous and self-determining as men.” Hans, Bertens, Literary Theory: The Basics (London and New York, 2001), 101Google Scholar. Focusing on the language and the theory of discourse, poststructuralism has occupied a central place in the approaches of the recent literary theoreticians. As an example one can refer to Judith Butler who considers the construction of all identities, including womanhood and manhood, as a result of discourse and nothing outside it. See Judith, Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York and London, 1990)Google Scholar. French feminism rejects the idea of a special female style and language. Kristeva refers to masculine discourses and suggests that sexual identities must be deconstructed. She asserts that there is nothing which can support the idea of a female style. Toril, Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics (London, 1985), 163Google Scholar. According to Luce Irigary there is a great need for a linguistic revolution that challenges the masculinity and manhood which have dominated western subjects and discussions. Luce, Irigary, “Sexual Difference”, in French Feminist Thought: A Reader, ed. by Troil Moi, trans. by Sean Hand (London, 1987), 118–130Google Scholar.

4 Galawej is the wife of Ibrahim Ahmad who was the author of an early Kurdish novel, Jani Gal (The Suffering of People). Galawej has lived in London since the early 1970s and has published eight novels. In this article I have only chosen her latest novel. The theme of her other novels is most frequently the struggle of the Kurds for their national rights.

5 Mahabad Qaradaghi has lived in Sweden since 1993. She is mainly known as a poet and has published several collections of poems. Koch (Migration) was labeled as a short story by its author when it was published in 1994 in Sweden. The same story was later on published in 2004 as a novel, without any explanation by its author.

6 Comparison of Nawroz's character with the memoirs of the author (published in 2005) shows that this novel has strong autobiographical features—there are many similarities between Nawroz's experiences and the life of the author. See Mahabad, Qaradaghi, Salek la dozakh (A Year in Hell) (Hawler, 2005)Google Scholar.

7 As these dates show the duration of the writing of this novel is ten days. There is no rule or time limit for writing a novel, but one can wonder whether a serious novel can be written in ten days.

8 The names of the two main characters of the novel, Xazal and Las, are borrowed from a famous popular Kurdish ballad in which Las sacrifices his life for Xazal's love. It is interesting to know that these names had earlier been adapted as the name of the main characters of another Kurdish novel, Goli Shoran (The Flower of Shoran), written by a Kurdish author Ata Nahayi who published his novel in Iran in 1998.

9 Probably the main problem of this novel is its unspecified time. One of the traditional definitions of the novel as a literary form is that the novel deals with a specified number of characters in a specified time and place.

10 There is a strong similarity between the narrative technique of this novel and another Kurdish novel by Bakhtiyar Ali, i.e. Shari Mosiqara spiyakan (The City of the White Musicians), which was published in Silemani in 2005. In Bakhtiyar's novel the main narrator contacts a victim of the Anfal (the name of a systematic military operation carried out by Saddam Hussein against the Kurds in Iraqi in which tens of thousands of Kurds were massacred) and through his observations and notes narrates the events of the novel.

11 It is important to notice in passing that the narrator's reference to her son in the story originates from a real event in the author's own life in which her fourteen-year-old son, Chiya, thinking he would be able to unify himself with the soul of Bruce Lee, committed suicide in Stockholm in February 2005.

12 Ehlam, Mansur, Alwan (Alwan) (Hawler, 2004)Google Scholar. ‘Alwan’ is a proper noun that refers to a river in the city of Khanaqin in Iraqi Kurdistan.

13 Though at one point the number of his wives is given as five. Mahabad, Qaradaghi, Avin awi zhiyana (Love is the Water of Life) (2004), 166Google Scholar.

14 Takrit is the city where Saddam Hussein was born. Takriti refers to Saddam, one who is from Takrit.

15 Ereb Shemo, the father of the Kurdish novel, published his Dimdim in Kurmanji in 1966 in the former Soviet Union. The book was published again in 1983 in Sweden. Shukur Mistafa translated it into Sorani Kurdish and published it in 1975 in Baghdad. The Sorani version of the book was published for the second time in 1984.

16 Although in Casim Celil's poetic retelling of the same story, which is admittedly not a novel, Gulbihar (an equivalent character to Parizad) plays an important role and there are a lot of remarks about the bravery of the women. (I am grateful to Christine Allison who reminded me of this point.)

17 Qaradaghi, Avin awi zhiyana, 129.

18 Pushkin wrote Eugene Onegin in 1829–33 and Vikram, Seth wrote The Golden Gate in 1986Google Scholar. These novels are in poetry. Lord Byron's Don Juan is another well-known narrative in verse.

19 For an account of the main differences between the novel and the romance see Rene Wellek and Austin Warren, Theory of Literature: A Seminal Study of the Nature and Function of Literature in all its contexts (London, 1956), 216Google Scholar.

20 The flourishing of popular novels in Iran is a reaction to the social and political realities of this country where cultural and political crises have resulted in deep crises of identity, especially among the younger generation. The lack of public entertainment facilities has contributed to an increase in interest in popular novels. Women have an upper hand in producing such novels in Iran. In such popular novels, in opposition to the quality novels, it is not literary quality which is demanded. Rather the entertainment aspect of this kind of novel is foremost, and social problems are reflected. For more information about Iranian women novelists see Hasan, Abedini, “Dastan nevisiy-e zanan: rahhay-e rafte va dastavardha” (Women's Story Writing: Its Course and Achievements), Baran, 5–6 (2004), 153–162Google Scholar.

21 Virginia, Woolf, A Room of One's Own (London, 1994), 53–54Google Scholar.

22 Woolf, A Room of One's Own, 116.

23 From 1640 until 1700 the writings of women made up only 1.2 percent of books published in Britain. For detailed information about the condition of women in Europe and the question of gender during the different periods of Europe's history, see Wiesner, Merry E., Women and Gender in Early Modern Europe: New Approaches to European History (Cambridge, 2000)Google Scholar.

24 Wiesner, Women and Gender, 190.

25 The presence of various social and cultural problems even in European countries forced some women writers adopt male pseudonyms for their published works. Among such women one can include the Swede Ernest Ahlgren, which was Viktoria Benediktsson's male pseudonym. The English writer Mary Evans published her books under the name George Eliot. The fact that these authors’ books were for a long time read as works written by men can be used as a strong argument for the non-existence of linguistic and structural differences between the writing of men and women.

26 Gilbert, Sandra M. and Gubar, Susan, The Mad Woman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination (New Haven, CT and London, 2000), 47Google Scholar.

27 See footnote 20.

28 In fact, there is no tradition of women writing in Kurdish before the second half of the twentieth century. It is interesting that very prominent Kurdish woman writer, Mastura Kurdistani (1805–49), wrote many books in the first half of the nineteenth century in the field of history, poetry, Islamic thought and the lives of Kurdish poets. Mastura belonged to the Kurdish aristocracy in Ardalan Municipality and was married to Khosrow Khan who was the head of the Kurdish municipality with Sine as its capital city. Her main writings are in Persian. However, she wrote some poems in Kurdish.

29 There is only one exception to this rule as far as the tradition of Kurdish women writers is considered. This exception is Mastura Ardalan (see footnote 28). It is worth noting that Mastura's life and character have become the main theme of two recent novels written by men: Tewsene Reshid, Masture Taji Sari Jiyane (Mastura is the Crown of the Life) and Jamal Ahmad Ayin, Mastura: Chand Laparayak le mejuyaki tamgirtu (Some Pages from a Foggy History). The latter novel is originally written in Persian and is translated into Kurdish by Adnan Barzinji. These novels were published in 2005 in Hawler. In December 2005 a Congress was held in Hawler for the two hundredth anniversary of Mastura's birthday. A collection of Mastura's works was published in eight volumes by Aras Press and Publisher in Hawler in the same year.

30 Among the Kurdish women poets who have published collections of their poems one can name Mahabad Qeredaghi, Zhila Hosseini, Simin Chaychi, Venus Fayeq, Dlsoz Heme, Choman Hardi, Nazand Bagikhani, Kazhal Ahmad, Tishka Mohammadpour, Nigar Nadir and Akhin Walat. There are also a large number of Kurdish women poets who publish their poems in the various Kurdish newspapers, journals and websites. It is interesting to note that a large number of those Kurdish women who have published their poems live in Europe.

31 For an aesthetic account of depicting the inner feelings and thoughts of a woman see a short story, ‘Ew balinde brindarey ke minim’ (That Wounded Bird That I Am) written by the Kurdish novelist Ata Nahayi. This short story, alongside some other short stories by the same writer, was published in 2004 in Hawler by Aras Press and Publisher.

32 Showalter, discussing the development of female literary tradition, argues “[i]n looking at literary subcultures, such as black, Jewish, Canadian, Anglo-Indian, or even American, we can see that they all go through three phases. First, there is a prolonged phase of imitation of the prevailing modes of the dominant tradition, and internalization of its standards of art and its views on social roles. Second, there is a phase of protest against these standards and values, and advocacy of minority rights and values, including a demand for autonomy. Finally, there is a phase of self-discovery, a turning inward freed from some of the dependency of opposition, a search for identity,” Showalter, Elaine, A Literature of Their Own: From Charlotte Bronte to Doris Lessing (London, 1999), 240Google Scholar. Showalter's terminology for these stages of women's writing are Feminine, Feminist, and Female. She identifies these phases with specific periods: “the Feminine phase as the period from the appearance of the male pseudonym in the 1840s to the death of George Eliot in 1880; the Feminist phase as 1880 to 1920, or the winning of the vote; and the Female phase as 1920 to the present, but entering a new stage of self-awareness about 1960.” Showalter, A Literature of Their Own, 13. Showalter's periodization does not fit to the experience of writing by the Kurdish women as they start writing almost during the third period of her periodization. While the Western women writers enter the “female” and “stage of self awareness about 1960” there are no signs of any text written by the Kurdish women.

33 Bertens, Literary Theory, 101.

34 For some feminist critics the reading of women's texts must take into consideration the difficult situation of women. They suggest an extra-literary approach to decipher women's writings. Gilbert and Gubar, in the Madwoman in the Attic, argue that in the texts written by women there is, besides a culturally adjusted aspect, a hidden aspect which shows women in revolt. In fact, the title of their book refers to the hidden “madwoman” in the attic, in Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. It is the screams of this “madwoman,” Bertha Mason, that now and then are heard. For them the duty of feminist criticism is to discover this hidden scream in the writings of women. The reader of Kurdish women's novels does not find enough evidence of the existence of such a “hidden aspect.”