1 Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia Corso di laurea in Lingue e Letterature Europee e Americane Tesi di Laurea Magistrale in Letterature Nordiche The Implication within a Prefix Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s Works and their Problematic Definition as invandrarlitteratur Relatore: Prof. Massimo Ciaravolo Correlatore: Prof.ssa Valerie Wainwright Anno Accademico 2012/2013 Candidato: Fabio Giuliari 2 3 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 05 METHODOLOGY AND PURPOSE 08 QUOTATIONS AND NOTES 10 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 10 CHAPTER I – The Writer 13 1.1 SHORT BIOGRAPHY 14 1.2 SOURCES OF LITERARY INSPIRATION 15 1.3 A POSSIBLE SOURCE OF INSPIRATION 17 1.3.1 Borta i tankar 17 1.3.2 Elixir 20 CHAPTER II – Blattesvenska or Halimiska? 23 2.1 RINKEBY AND RINKEBYSVENSKA 25 2.2 INVANDRARLITTERATUR AND RACISM 30 2.3 LANGUAGE IN ETT ÖGA RÖTT 33 2.4 JULIA GROßE’S “A COMPARISON” 40 2.5 HALIMISKA – A LANGUAGE TO FIND ONESELF 43 CHAPTER III – The Unreliable Narrator 51 3.1 MONTECORE, A NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS 52 3.1.1 The style of the novel and the narrators 52 3.1.2 The time issue in the novel 57 3.1.3 The language 59 3.2 THE THEMES OF THE NOVEL 67 3.2.1 A different idea of integration 68 3.2.2 The eclipse of the father 75 3.3 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL LENS 79 CHAPTER IV – The Family in a Racist World 85 4.1 BOMBINGS IN STOCKHOLM – FACTS 86 4 4.2 “JAG RINGER MINA BRнDER”, THE GENESIS 089 4.3 JAG RINGER MINA BRÖDER 092 4.3.1 Narrator, voice, and point of view 093 4.3.2 Time 095 4.4 THE THEMES OF THE NOVEL 097 4.4.1 The family issue 104 4.5 THE BOOK REVIEWS AND THE POLITICAL LENS CHAPTER V – Khemiri the Playwright 108 117 5.1 RECEPTION OF THE CRITICS 119 5.2 LANGUAGE IN INVASION! 122 5.3 INDIVIDUALITY AND IDENTITY IN INVASION! 127 5.4 SOCIAL CRITICISM 131 5.5 THEATRICAL DIS-ILLUSION IN KHEMIRI’S PLAYS 135 CONCLUSION 143 SVENSK SAMMANFATTNING 147 BIBLIOGRAPHY 151 PRIMARY SOURCES 151 SECONDARY SOURCES 152 REVIEWS, ARTICLES, AND INTERVIEWS 155 WEB SOURCES 159 5 INTRODUCTION During the summer of 2012, after surgery, I was confided to bed for a month. I spent that tranquil time reading constantly, devoted to literature. In a month, I read a substantial amount of books of various sorts. Among them, one book greatly struck me: the Italian translation of Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s Montecore. Its astonishing use of language and its fascinating characters were greatly involving; I felt I had found something I could work on. A couple of months before, I had agreed with my thesis supervisor to write my final essay on Swedish literature, focusing on contemporary writers depicting familiar changes. A Swedish friend of mine suggested I read Khemiri’s Ett öga rött (One Eye Red), which she found relevant for my project. Since my knowledge in Swedish was basic at that time1 and Ett öga rött has never been translated in either Italian or English, I read the only book translated in Italian of this unknown writer: Montecore. I read it in two days and I thought it was a perfect fit for necessity. Montecore is a story that deals with the relationship between the protagonist and his father. Moreover, its brilliant style and its implications made the book even more intriguing. Shortly after my recovery, I went to Malmö to attend an intensive language course. There, I bought Ett öga rött, and I started to read it. It took me three months to read it thoroughly, enjoying every single page and the effort was well re-paid. 1 Since I attended undergraduate courses at the University of Padua, where Scandinavian languages were not offered, at the time I had studied Swedish for one year only. 6 Halim and Otman were what I was looking for: a complex father and son relationship that is very far from the familiar patriarchal ideal. Halim was rebellious, independent, and outrageous, and on the other hand, his father seemed to have no influence on his son’s education. I had found an appropriate writer to analyse and use to examine the patriarchal crisis in Swedish literature. I remember I thought Sweden would be an extremely open country, where traditional family values were challenged – otherwise, why would the tender Swedish fathers who look after their children surprise every tourist? “Sweden is the country of gender equality, and Khemiri depicts a familiar transformation in his literature!” I thought. At the time, I did not examine the deeper implications of Khemiri’s novels, the aspect that reveals that Sweden is not as it appears. It can be racist and unjust. Perhaps I was too influenced by the common external conception that Nordic countries are paradises on Earth. Meanwhile, I moved to Gothenburg, where I resided for ten months with an Erasmus scholarship. During the time I would study Swedish, take courses, and research material for my thesis in an unfamiliar environment. I was still sure that I would find extensive articles and essays about familiar relationships in Ett öga rött and Montecore. When Khemiri’s last novel Jag ringer mina bröder (I Ring my Brothers) was published, I reinforced my theory considering that a writer would not use the word “brothers” in a title, if he was not interested in familiar issues. Jag ringer mina bröder convinced me that I was on a right path. It was then time to look for a solid academic foundation, but what I found was not what I expected. Critics and professors wrote their papers on Khemiri’s sociolinguistic and political implications, questioning his reliability as a reporter of the suburbs. I was shocked to find that the critiques of Khemiri’s literary 7 characteristics were solely based on his linguistic style, and that critics constantly stressed the fact that Khemiri’s father is Tunisian, and therefore Khemiri has to be considered an invandrarförfattare (immigrant writer). I had heard something about these Swedish immigrant writers, including Theodor Kallifatides (1938), a Greek writer who migrated to Sweden in 1964 and started to write in Swedish already towards the end of the Sixties. So I double-checked Khemiri’s nationality, certain that he was born in Stockholm. I was correct, but I could not understand why he was labeled an invandrarförfattare. I failed to understand why a Swedish native was considered an immigrant in his own land until I read two enlightening articles written by another Swedish novelist: Astrid Trotzig. The articles were “Makten över prefixen” (The Power of the Prefix) and “Biografi som kategori” (Biography as a Category). I realized that Khemiri was not considered completely Swedish because of his father’s Tunisian origin, assuming a multicultural background. Furthermore, I realized that this prejudice was what prevented critics from being objective. Khemiri was labeled as an invandrarförfattare, expected to deal only with racism, multicultural backgrounds, and the corruption of standard language. Indeed, why should a white Swedish critic expect a writer, considered ethnically different, to write about Swedish families? Why should this critic expect this writer to write about universal values and such topics, if he belongs to a minority group? I discovered that the issue is deeply connected with social bias. These questions provoked my interest in a thesis that was different from the one that was originally planned. Even after extensive research, I could not deny my concern of predictive conclusions that invandrarförfattare write about minorities and 8 suburb idiolects. I have always considered Khemiri to be an excellent writer, not only because of his ability to master the Swedish language, but also because of his vivid descriptions and explorations of personal human relationships. Thus, my thesis developed into an effort to demonstrate the complexity of Khemiri’s literature, a complexity which goes beyond what is socially, culturally, literately hinted and defined by the prefix invandrar-. METHODOLOGY AND PURPOSE My thesis will primarily focus on three novels: Ett öga rött, Montecore, and Jag ringer mina bröder. The problem of contemporary literature is that it is hard to find critical material to support one’s hypothesis, making it essential to consider reviews and interviews in newspapers and magazines. I have indeed decided it crucial not to ignore any kind of source material. Since I aim to undermine a consolidated view of Swedish critics, my thesis might appear quite destructive rather than constructive. However, I want to point out that my criticism could be considered a starting point for those students who want to approach Khemiri’s novels from a new point of view. The definition of invandrarlitteratur, as I will discuss, deals with three main expectations: a) the language used by the invandrarförfattare is a reliable representation of the idiolects used by people in Swedish multiethnic suburbs, b) the invandraförfattare tends to create autobiographical characters, c) the most important implications of the invandrarlitteratur (immigrant literature) are political, because 9 the invandrarförfattare aims to undermine the white bourgeois establishment. These assumptions have prevented Swedish critics from objectively analysing Khemiri’s work. Through my analysis of Ett öga rött, I will demonstrate how the peculiar language that the writer has used has many aesthetic connotations and it is not only a mere misconception implied by invandrarsvenska. To do so, I will consider Julia Prentice’s PHD research which compares the actual Swedish language spoken by young second generation immigrants with the language which Halim, the protagonist of the novel, uses in his diary. Secondly, I will support the idea that Montecore is not strictly an autobiographical novel, despite the fact that the main character is named after the writer. On the contrary, an ironic intent is imposed by the author, and to prove it I will refer to Troztig’s essays. Finally, I will expand on how the political issue is as much relevant as the other themes in Khemiri’s latest novel Jag ringer mina bröder. In this section I will consider the reviews of the novel that merely focused on the political issue, proposing an argument that the story would lose its deeper value if the attention was not put also on the protagonist’s personal relationships and friendships. After this analysis of the novels I will also write a chapter analysing some plays written by Khemri, trying to give an overview of his great ability as playwright. My thesis serves two different purposes: it primarily aims to present Khemiri’s widely unknown works to the Italian public, and secondly to deconstruct the prejudices that critics have against Khemiri. For this purpose, I will consider the critics’ reception of Khemiri’s works in reviews and I will adopt a narratological 10 perspective. My analysis of the narrative structure will mostly be based on semiotic studies and it will refer to Elementi di teoria letteraria (1984) by Franco Brioschi and Costanzo Di Girolamo, L’officina del racconto (1990) by Angelo Marchese, and Il testo narrativo (2005) by Remo Ceserani and Andrea Bernardelli. QUOTATIONS AND NOTES Since I will often refer to and quote from Khemiri’s works, I have decided to indicate the titles and the pages of the novels, and plays, in brackets right after the references and quotations. This will serve to avoid useless and unaesthetic lists of the same works in the foot-notes. When I refer to an English translation of Khemiri’s works that is not mine, I will indicate the translator’s name, the title of the book and the page in brackets. For the notes and the bibliography of this thesis, I have referred to the Chicago Manual of Style Online. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In the course of writing this thesis, I have incurred numerous debts. For my professors at the University of Florence, for their patience, passion, and help, I am most grateful. 11 Alessandro Bassini has been extremely helpful in finding sources, which I had no chance to find. He has also helped me in understanding the intricate world of translation and has given me priceless ideas for future researches. At the same time I want to thank Julia Prentice who has given me material to work on and open access to her research. Advice given by Nico De Lillo has also been a great help in finding sources. I am deeply indebted to Jonas Hassen Khemiri who has given me a version of his play Apatiska för nybörjare (Apathy for Beginners) and for his wonderful novels that gave me numerous moments of great pleasure. I hope I will meet him personally in the future time. Many thanks go to Lorraine McLaughlin, Vivian Oh, and Jacqui De Bono who have corrected my first draft. I am very grateful to Armando Cremona, for his encouragement and help with the final summary in Swedish. I wish also to acknowledge the practical help provided by Mario Meloni. This thesis is dedicated to my parents, whose affection and support has enabled me to follow my dreams. 12 13 CHAPTER I – The Writer Biography and Inspiration The award-winning novelist and playwright Jonas Hassen Khemiri is very well known in Sweden, however he is relatively unheard of abroad. Despite the fact that his work has been translated into many languages,2 he is still an undiscovered talent for many readers. Khemiri is a young writer with only a few publications, writing in many different genres including novels, short stories and theatre. Khemiri is a skilled artist but he is often difficult to interpret for two reasons: first of all his language does not respect Swedish grammatical rules and many foreign and invented words are used. Secondly, his stories deal with a specific Swedish background that is hard to understand for those who are not familiar with Sweden and its society. Once a reader can solve these initial problems, they will find themselves absorbed in an original literature that is full of ideas and truth. This first chapter gives the background information that is required to understand the analysis made in the subsequent chapters. After a short biography, there follows a brief description of two short stories written by Alejandro Leiva Wenger, a Swedish writer who, through his collection of stories called Till vår ära (To Our Honor), published in 2001, has in some respects anticipated Khemiri’s style. 2 Ett öga rött has been translated in Norwegian, Finnish, Danish, German, Serbian and Dutch. Montecore has been published also in Italy, USA, Hungary, France, but not in Serbia. His piece Invasion! has been played in New York, while his other theatrical works, his short stories, and his last book Jag ringer mina bröder has not been translated yet. 14 1.1 SHORT BIOGRAPHY Jonas Hassen Khemiri was born in Stockholm on 27 December 1978 to a Tunisian father and a Swedish mother. His first book Ett öga rött (One Eye Red) was published in 2003 and sold over 200.000 copies.3 From his debut, it was clear that Khemiri was an interesting writer. In 2004, the Swedish newspaper Borås Tidning awarded him with a prize for debut novels.4 The panel of judges described the novel as “a smart and sensitive work which deeply investigates language and makes Swedish shine as if it were new”.5 Khemiri studied at Södra Latins gymnasium6 and later international business and literature at the universities of Stockholm and Paris. After graduation, he worked as an apprentice at the United Nations Security Council in New York. Besides Swedish, he can speak French and English fluently. In an interview for an Italian website, Khemiri admitted that his personal experience in New York had intensely influenced his writing.7 He finished his first book in the spring of 2002 while he was still in New York. The difficulties he faced when speaking a language different to his own mother tongue inspired him. Ett öga rött deals with the idea of feeling subordinated to a language without knowing how to escape it. 3 Biographical information can be found at www.khemiri.se/biografi. Since 2001 the Borås Tidnings debutantpris has been given to Swedish novel-writers or poets who stands out with their first published work. 5 Judges words are: “För en smart och hjärtevarm roman som drattar språket på ända och får svenskan att glänsa som om den vore ny.” “Borås Tidnings debuttpris”, Borås Tidning, last modified January 31, 2012, http://www.bt.se/kultur/bts_debutantpris/om-boras-tidnings-debutantpris%28348367%29.gm. 6 The Södra Latin is a selective high school in Stockholm. Many famous Swedish people went to this school, among them: John Landquist, Stig Dagerman, and Tomas Tranströmer. 7 Giovanni Pannacci, “Intervista a Jonas Hassen Khemiri”, Mangialibri, March 15, 2010, accessed February 20, 2013, http://www.mangialibri.com/node/6012. 4 15 In 2009, Khemiri lived between Stockholm and Berlin, after receiving a year’s scholarship from the German Academic Exchange Service 8. Although it may seem pointless to list the prizes that have been awarded to Jonas Hassen Khemiri, it is, however, of interest to mention a couple of them, since they demonstrate the success he has gained. In 2006 Khemiri received the P. O. Enquists pris (Per Olof Enquist’s Prize),9 and in 2007 he received the Stockholms stads Bellmanpris (Bellman’s Price of the City of Stockholm). 10 Additionally in 2007 he was awarded the Sveriges Radios Romanpris (Novel Prize of the Radio of Sweden)11 and then in 2008 the Sveriges Radios Novellpris (Short Story Prize of the Radio of Sweden)12. 1.2 SORCES OF LITERARY INSPIRATION To date, Khemiri has published five books and written as many plays. As a young writer, Khemiri’s writing style is constantly evolving. Consequently it is very challenging to define the kind of literature that influences his work. Nevertheless, it 8 The DAAD (Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst) is a private self-governing organization of higher education in Germany. More information can be found at: www.daad.org. 9 Another famous and talented writer who received the same prize is the Icelandic Jòn Kalman Stefànsson in 2011. 10 “Stockholms stads Bellmapris”, Stockholms stad kulturpriser, accessed April 30, 2013, http://www.stockholm.se/KulturFritid/Stod/Kulturpriser/. 11 “Sveriges radios romanpris”, Sveriges Radio, last modified March 6, 2007, http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=499&artikel=1238939. 12 “Sveriges radios novellpris”, Sveriges Radio, accessed April 15, 2013, http://sverigesradio.se/sida/gruppsida.aspx?programid=1057&grupp=4169&artikel=2240398. 16 is pertinent to list here the books and the authors which, according to his statements, he particularly likes. In a long interview with him published in the Swedish magazine Vi Läser (2009), Khemiri was asked by Jonas Eklöf to list three literary models and three unforgettable short classics. He answered: Marguerite Dumas for her obstinacy, Per Olof Enquist for his sharpness, and Richard Pryor for his smart humor, respectively. Moreover, he mentioned Aura (1962) by the Mexican Carlos Fuentes, Dix heures et demie du soir en été (1960) (Ten-Thirty on a Summer Night) by Marguerite Dumas, and The Thief and the Dogs (1961) by the Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz.13 In an article published in the daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter (October 15, 2012), Khemiri stated that his favourite book is Per Olof Enquist’s Nedstörtad ängel (1985) (Downfall: a love story).14 In addition, in an interview for the New Yorker Times (September 8, 2011), Khemiri listed among his influences, besides Marguerite Dumas and Per Olov Enquist, the Italian writer Italo Calvino, the Argentinian novelist Julio Cortázar, and the rapper Nasir Jones.15 Thus we can conclude that both Marguerite Dumas and Per Olof Enquist hold an intense attraction for Khemiri and that most of his favourite pieces were written in the Sixties and, furthermore, that he includes among his inspirations a comedian and a rapper. Jonas Eklöf, “I väntan på inspiration”, Vi laser, 2009, accessed January 20, 2013, http://www.khemiri.se/assets/0000/0696/jhk-intervju-vi-laser-hosten-2009.pdf. 14 Carin Stålhberg, ”Jag skriver för att hitta nyanserna”, DN, October 10, 2012, accessed, January 20, 2013, http://www.dn.se/dnbok/dnbok-hem/jag-skriver-for-att-hitta-nyanserna. 15 Eric Grode, “Subversive Tongue and a Sharp Focus on Identity Politics”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, New York Times, September 8, 2011, accessed March 15, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/theater/jonas-hassen-khemiri-the-playwright-behind-invasion.html. 13 17 Moreover, it is fundamental to include Khemiri’s work in an innovative literary trend that started in Sweden at the beginning of this century. Although it is premature to define it as a proper trend, it is undeniable that some writers have chosen a particular – and similar – stylistic and linguistic form in which to write their works. They use a broken Swedish that might seem to represent the language spoken in different ways by immigrants. The following is an overview of the first published stories that used this peculiar language whilst from the second chapter on Khemir’s Swedish language and style are analysed. Alejandro Antonio Leiva Wenger published a collection of short stories in 2001 entitled Till vår ära. The later Snabba Cash (2006) (Fast Money) by Jens Lapidus, and Kalla det vad fan du vill (2005) (Call it what the hell you want) by Marjaneh Bakhtiari are other books that can be included in this trend, but these will not be taken into consideration as they were published after Khemiri’s debut. 1.3 A POSSIBLE SOURCE OF INSPIRATION: ALEJANDRO LEIVA WENGER’S TILL VÅR ÄRA 1.3.1 Borta i tankar ”Borta i tankar” (Lost in Thought) is the first of the short stories collected in Till vår ära. It is a story about a young man who engages with a multi-ethnic group of friends. He has recently changed high school, leaving the one where his friends are 18 studying for a new one mainly attended by Swedish students. The story is about loyalty and the rules that determine the dynamics of the group. At the same time a parallel story in which the love affair between Felipe (the main protagonist) and Julia, a young Swedish woman is told. As Roger Källström writes in “Literary Use of Multiethnic Youth Language: non-inversion in Swedish Fiction”: The conflict in the mind of Felipe between loyalty to his old friends and the multilingual setting where he lives, and loyalty to Julia and the middle class setting of his new school is the theme of the story. The story conveys an impression of the intense working of Felipe’s mind, when he is trying to sort out what has happened lately, thinking back and forth, trying to work out when, where and why things went wrong, and who he really is and where he belongs. 16 The story is approximately twenty pages in length, but the style is complex and varied. Jenne Maes describes the language as a “multnietnisk slang, ett exempel på hiphopfrasering i både ordval och rytm”17 (multi-ethnic slang, an example of hip hop phrasing in both word choice and rhythm). Leiva Wenger decided to insert two separated parts into the text, in which capitalized and normal lines alternate to give a distinctive stylistic effect. The language used in the text becomes an identity-marker, defining the characters and their social background. 18 In point of fact, the language is a multi-ethnic Swedish slang that does not respect any of the rules of the Swedish language; Leiva Wegner was the first writer to use a broken language that aims to stand opposite standard Swedish. The whole story focuses on status and class barriers that are adopted by a group of people who, despite the fact that they live in Sweden, Roger Källström, “Literary Use of Multiethnic Youth Language: non-inversion in Swedish Fiction”, in Multilingual Urban Scandinavia: New Linguistic Practices, Ed. Pia Quist and Bente A. Svendsen, (Bristol: Multilingual Matters, 2010), 147. 17 Jenne Maes, ”Våda Invandrare”, (Master Thesis, University of Gent, 2011), 28. 18 Monica Gomér, “shu len, vad händish”, (Student Essay, University of Gothenburg, 2008), 3. 16 19 do not consider themselves Swedish. The language is consequently central to defining who they really are. This concept has later been adopted by Khemiri who wrote both Ett öga rött and Montecore paying particular attention to style and language. Moreover, significant interest is paid to Felipe’s name. The story is told in both the first and the third person, consequently the protagonist is sometimes jag (I), sometimes han (he). He is called Fällan (lit. the snare) by his friends, but at one point Jaime asks him what his real name is: - Fällan? – hon skrattade och knuffade till mej med armbågen. – Lägg av, vad är det för namn? - Vaddå, jag heter så – sa han. [...] - Så kan man inte heta, det är ju inte ett riktigt namn. - Jag kallas så, alla kallar mej så. [...] – Men vad heter du på riktigt?19 (- Fällan? – she laughed and nudged me – Leave off, what kind of name is it? - What? That’s my name – he said. […] - That can’t be, that’s not a real name. - They call me that way, everybody calls me so. […] – But what’s your real name?)20 The importance of one’s name here is pivotal. Our names define us, especially if they do not conform to the society in which we live. This theme has also been developed by Khemiri, especially in his novel Montecore, and in his play Invasion!. At the end of the short story, Jaime tells Felipe what his name means “friend of the horses”. He is given another name which is add to all the others: 19 20 Alejandro Leiva Wenger, “Borta i tankar”, in Till vår ära, (Stockholm: Albert Bonniers Förlag, 2001), 10. If not specified, translation is mine. 20 - Hästvän? – sa Felipe, sa han, sa jag, sa Fällan.21 (- Friend of the horses? – Felipe said, he said, I said, Fällan said.) The main character now has five names and all together they partially describe who he really is. He may have many names, but he lacks an identity. In effect the story is about his crisis. The message that Leiva Wenger wants to convey is that names only partially describe who we are and likewise the language we speak. It is impossible to express our identity in words, and no matter how hard we try to define ourselves, we will never succeed. 1.3.2 Elixir “Elixir” is the second short story in Till vår ära. The style adopted is the so-called stream of consciousness: the narrative is told as a stream of words that represent the “natural” expression of a character’s thoughts in the first person. Every grammatical, syntactic and lexical rule is disregarded. The text consists of one extensive paragraph, with no capitalization, and endeavors to represent the thoughts of a protagonist. One of the characters, Marco, has received a bottle in the post containing an unidentified drink. When he samples it, he discovers it to be a potion that gradually transforms those who drink it into a Swede. This is a slow process that commences with a physical transformation (dark eyes turn blue and dark hair becomes blonde), and ends by changing the drinker’s way of thinking. His friends, including the first person narrator, try it. When the potion has finished, Marco receives a letter that 21 Leiva Wenger, ”Borta i tankar”, 27. 21 reveals the ingredients and the recipe. Ironically and dramatically, they need cat’s eyes to complete it. Once they understand that they are losing their identities in order to become Swedish, they decide to desist. The story ends tragically: Marcela, Marco’s girlfriend, drinks too much potion and is taken to hospital. The ending is left open. Particular examples of language gives a certain idea of what contributes to a sense of identity: “… du snackar fett som en svenne22.”23 (... you chat cool like a Swede.) “… han sa ord som svenskar kan.”24 (... he talks like Swedes do.) Swedes and immigrants do not and cannot speak the same language. They are represented as two separate and opposite worlds and when a person belongs to one, the other is unattainable. This appears even clearer when they realize that there is no way for them to maintain their identities when they are transformed into Swedes: “...sen kom Flaco och sa han kunde inte komma ihåg nästan ett enda ord på spanska. vi sa fan den där läsken gör att man blir svenne. fan tänk om vi skrattade som fan men sen sa marco nej jag vill inte bli för jag är stolt över att va svarting och jag sa jag med för jag är det.” 25 (... then Flaco came and said he couldn’t remember almost any words in Spanish we said fuck the drink makes one turn Swedish. Fuck, think of 22 The word svenne means Swede and it has been in used since at least 1968. It is an offensive term and often used by immigrants to insult the Swedes. Reference to AA.VV. Svensk Ordbok utgiven av Svenska Akademien, (Stockholm: Svenska Akademien, 2009). 23 Alejandro Leiva Wenger, “Elixir”, in Till vår ära, (Stockholm: Albert Bonniers Förlag, 2001), 35. 24 Leiva Wegner, ”Elixir”, 36. 25 Leiva Wegner, ”Elixir”, 39. 22 we fucking laughed but then Marco said no I don’t wanna turn ‘cause I’m proud of bein’ blackish and I agreed ‘cause I also am.) When the young protagonists decide not to continue with the transformation into Swedes, they show themselves to be loyal to their roots, and they understand that they should be proud of whom they are. They fear that integration translates into loss, and they do not want to renounce their identities. Some of Khemiri’s characters seem to share this fear, but what is essential to understand is that, according to this vision, there are two incompatible worlds: one for the Swedes and one for the immigrants. These two opposites represent different realities and they use different languages to express themselves. However, Leiva Wenger’s story appears to contain a subtle critique. It deals with stereotypes and classifications of immigrants and Swedes, and it demonstrates the negative consequences of being prejudiced. Above all, the story criticizes the inclination to see the two groups as ‘Us against the others’. 26 26 Maes, ”Våda Invandrare”, 29. 23 CHAPTER II – Blattesvenska or Halimiska? Halim’s language in Ett öga rött When Kehmiri’s first novel came out, most of the reviews considered the language used by the author as a realistic multi-ethnic youth language. 27 Khemiri was initially defined as one of those writers who belong to a new wave within the wide group of invandrerförfattare (immigrant writers). Until the end of the Second World War, Sweden was essentially an ethnically homogeneous country where the few immigrants were mostly Finnish. In the early fifties Sweden had to face a growing demand for workers; many people (initially European) moved to this country seeking employment and leaving behind the desolation caused by the war. Åke Nilsson observes: Flera faktorer påverkar hur många invandrare som kommer till Sverige. Några exempel är krig och oroligheter i andra delar av världen, arbetsmarknaden i Sverige och den statliga regleringen av invandringen. I början av efterkrigstiden, under 1950- och 1960-talet, kom invandrarna från våra nordiska grannländer, Central- och Sydeuropa.28 (Many reasons influence the number of immigrants who come to Sweden. Some examples are war and violence in other parts of the world, the work market in Sweden and the government immigration laws. Right after the Second World War, during the 50’s and the 60’s, immigrants came from our Nordic neighbouring countries and from Central and Southern Europe.) 27 28 Roger Källström, “Flygande blattesvenska”, Svenskans beskrivning 28 (2006): 147-157. Åke Nilsson, Efterkrigstids invandring och utvandring (Stockholm: Statistik Centralbyrå, 2004), 7. 24 A few years later, some immigrants started to publish their books, mainly in Swedish. The so called invandrarlitteratur (immigrant literature) slowly became established. Since then the number of invandrarförfattare has been increasing and “among the Nordic countries at present Sweden produces the largest amount of immigrant literature”29. Initially, these writers described the Swedish reality from the inside, but from a particular point of view, due to their ethnic backgrounds. 30 Another important aspect is that many of the children of this first group of immigrants never learned their parents’ language properly, and a part of them started to speak a very peculiar Swedish that is either called invandrarsvenska (immigrant Swedish), or ungdomsdialekt (young people’s dialect), or rinkebysvenska (Swedish of Rinkeby), or, more disparagingly, even blattesvenska.31 In fact, these four words define a particular kind of Swedish which is spoken by a section of secondgeneration immigrants in Sweden. The aim of this chapter is, first of all, to give some more information about the multiethnic youth language spoken in areas where the concentration of immigrants is higher. Secondly, I will try to argue why the idea of invandrarlitteratur is in itself Satu Gröndahl, “Invandrar- och minoritetslitteraturer i Sverige”, in Litteraturens gränsland. Invandraroch minotitetslitteratur i nordisk perspektiv, ed. Satu Gröndahl (Uppsala: Uppsala Universitetet Press, 2002), 63. 30 Alessandro Bassini, “Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi – l’affermazione della lingua degli immigrati nella letteratura svedese contemporanea”, Linguistica e filologia 28 (2009): 112. 31 It is important to specify the meanings of the words blatte and invandrare, since they will be very used. According to the definition given by the dictionary edited by the Swedish Academy, an invandrare is a “person som invandrat till ett visst land” (person who has immigrated a certain land.) The definition that Wordreference.com gives of the word immigrant is almost the same: “a person who comes to a country in order to settle there.” The two terms invandrare and immigrant are therefore equivalent. It is more problematic the definition of blatte, which the dictionary edited by the Swedish Academy defines as: “(mörkhyad) utländks person” ((dark-skinned) foreign person.) The word has been in use since at least 1991, and is colloquial and often offensive. It defines every kind of dark-skinned people, from Africans to South Europeans, and it is not only used for people who emigrated to Sweden as the definition states. References to Svensk Ordbok utgiven av Svenska Akademien, and to http://wordreference.com. 29 25 racist. Finally, I will analyse Khemiri’s style and language in Ett öga rött, with a view to demonstrating how the first reviews of his books were mistaken in defining it as a realistic representation of invandrarsvenska. 2.1 RINKEBY AND RINKEBYSVENSKA Rinkeby is a district32 in the borough33 of Rinkeby-Kista, located in the north-western part of the municipality of Stockholm. The neighbourhood was built in the late 60’s and was part of the so called miljonprogramm34. Nowadays, Rinkeby is one of the neighbourhoods with the highest concentration of immigrants (almost 90%). As previously mentioned, Sweden did not attract many immigrants before the end of World War II. In the first half of the 20th century only intra-Nordic migration was considerable in numbers, especially from Finland to Sweden. Furthermore, the Finns represented the largest group of migrants to Sweden during the years 1945-80. In fact, in 1949 Sweden abolished visa requirements for Finnish citizens, as it had done earlier (1945) for Danes, Icelanders and Norwegians. The aim was to establish an extensive open Nordic employment market.35 This large intra-Nordic movement was facilitated by the mutual intelligibility among the Norwegian, Danish and Swedish languages. Moreover some Finns who moved to Sweden were actually Swedish native speakers, while many Finnish speakers had studied Swedish at 32 In Swedish: stadsdel. In Swedish: stadsdelsområde. 34 It was a program that aimed to build one million flats in ten years (between 1965 and 1974). The program was supported by the Social Democratic Party. 35 Harald Runblom, ”Immigration to Scandinavia after World War II”, in Ethnicity and Nation Building in the Nordic Wolrd, ed. Tägil (London: Hurst & Company, 1995), 288-291. 33 26 school. Runblom notices that “among emigrants who came to Sweden during the postwar period the Swedish speakers were strongly over-represented.”36 Besides this linguistic advantage, in the post-war period immigrants were “easily” absorbed because of their similar Nordic cultural roots. 37 Things changed totally in the Seventies and Eighties, when “pressure from refugees and asylum seekers (from the Third World) became heavier than at any time since the Second World War” 38 . Labor migrants and refugees showed different ambitions in preserving their cultures. Indeed the latter revealed a stronger will to protect traditions (even language traditions) in a country like Sweden which had, until that point, been linguistically and ethnically homogeneous. Consequently, Sweden had to become more tolerant towards new minorities, even though much effort has always been put into teaching Swedish to immigrants. Bassini observes: […] con l’arrivo sempre più massiccio di rifugiati, le istituzioni adottarono una politica più tollerante […]; ciò nonostante l’apprendimento della lingua è rimasto una delle chiavi di accesso privilegiate alla società svedese. Una rete capillare di corsi gratuiti, SFI (Svenska för invandrare, ‘Svedese per immigrati’), mira a fornire le conoscenze di base dello svedese […]39 ([…] with the ever growing flow of refugees, institutions adopted a more tolerant policy […]; however, language learning held fast as a favored pass key to Swedish society. A widespread net of free courses, SFI (Svenska för invandrare, ‘Swedish for immigrants’), aims to give basic linguistic knowledge […]) Runblom, ”Immigration to Scandinavia”, 290. Of course facts show that assimilation was not so easy. Many immigrants moved back to their countries after some time because of the difficult conditions they had to face. Especially the Finns were sometimes victims of open racism. It is also true that others have assimilated within one or few generations. On this, see: Altti Majava, “Finns in Sweden: Characteristics and Living Conditions”, in Finnish Diaspora I: Canada, South America, Africa, Australia and Sweden, ed. Karni (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1981). 38 Runblom, ”Immigration to Scandinavia”, 303. 39 Bassini, ”Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi”, 114. 36 37 27 Despite the availability of free Swedish courses, many immigrants did not succeed in learning the language perfectly and over the years many peculiarities in their way of speaking developed. Källström underlines that “för de flesta som lär sig svenska som andraspråk är det svårt att komma ihåg den omvända ordföljden när påståndesatster inte börjar med subjektet” 40 (For most of those who learn Swedish as a second language, it is difficult to remember the reversed word order when the main clause does not begin with the subject.) Indeed, the word order proves to be difficult for a learner of Swedish, 41 therefore Swedes tend to identify those who make such mistakes in spoken language as immigrants, or as people who have grown up in a multi-lingual background.42 At the same time the vocabulary of those who share a multi-ethnic environment has acquired many words that come from different languages, e.g. Turkish, Arabic, and Greek. Nowadays some of them are considered slang words and many are understood by native Swedes. A few examples are: para (from Turkish; it means money, pengar in standard Swedish), jalla (from Arabic, it means go/run, gå/springa Roger Källström, “Litterärt språk på tvärs. Lite om språket hos Leiva Wegner och Hassen Khemiri”, in Språk på tvärs, ed. Malmbjer De Geer (Uppsala: Univesitetstryckeriet ASLA och författarna, 2005), 151. 41 In Swedish, the verb must be placed in the second position in main clauses. When the first place is occupied by the subject the verb follows it: e.g. “Han (s) skriver (v) brev” (He writes letters). This word order is called rak ordföljd (straight word order). However, the first position could be taken by an adverb: e.g. “Ibland skiver (v) han (s) brev” (*Sometimes writes he letters, i.e. Sometimes he writes letters); or by a secondary clause: e.g. “När han har tid skriver (v) han (s) brev” (*When he has time writes he letters, i.e. When he has time, he writes letters). In these cases the word order is called omvänd ordföljd (reversed word order). Grown up learners tend not to respect this reversed order. Since the first position in a principal clause is very important in Nordic languages, it is often called fundament (foundation). The anomalous structure “Ibland han skriver brev” can therefore be called rak ordföljd efter fundament (straight word order after foundation). Källström, ”Litterärt språk på tvärs”, 151. 42 “Det tycks vara vanligt att svenskar identiferar den här strukturen med vad vi kan kalla utländsk svenska – svenska som på något sätt är präglad av att det är ett (ännu) inte fullständigt inlärt språk (inlärarspråk) eller påverkat av en mångspråkig miljö (t.ex. multietniskt ungdomsspråk).” Källström, ”Litterärt språk på tvärs”, 151. 40 28 in standard Swedish), habib (from Arabic, it means friend, kompis in standard Swedish), and ade/ayde (from Greek, they mean come!, kom! In standard Swedish.)43 Evidently, a distinction between the language spoken by the first generation of immigrants and the second has to be made. As Bassini observes: Mentre gli errori commessi dagli immigrati oggetto di studio nei primi anni Ottanta erano errori ‘genuini’, dati dalla difficoltà di apprendere la lingua per scarso grado di istruzione o rado contatto con la popolazione locale, i giovani migranti di seconda generazione scelgono spesso questo ‘dialetto’ intenzionalmente. Pur sapendo esprimersi in svedese corretto preferiscono ricorrere allo slang per marcare la propria differenza etnica […].44 (While the mistakes made by those immigrants whose cases were studied in the early Eighties were ‘spontaneous’, due to their difficulties in learning a language because of their low education level or infrequent social interaction with the local community, the second generation young immigrants often choose this ‘dialect’ with intent. Even though they can speak proper Swedish, they would rather use this slang to stress their ethic difference […].) While an earlier generation of immigrants spoke invandrarsvenska because they could not do ‘better’, younger groups of immigrants decided that invandrarsvenska was their language, despite the fact that they could speak proper Swedish. Initially many researchers thought that these younger immigrants, like their parents, were not able to express themselves in other ways. However, it could not be explained why, since they were raised and educated in Sweden. They began proudly to claim that they spoke rinkebysvenska.45 Even the non-inversion described above is a feature of this new multi-ethnic youth language. In her research “Subject-Verb Order Variation in the Swedish of 43 Ulla-Britt Kotsinas, Invandrar-svenska (Uppsala: Hallgren & Fallgren, 2005), 242. Bassini, “Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi”, 116. 45 Kotsinas, Invandrar-svenska, 238. 44 29 Young People in Multilingual Urban Areas”, Natalia Ganuza concludes that “the use of XSV [rak ordföljd efter fundament] could not be explained simply as a learner phenomenon” 46 and that “the use of XVS is [not only] part of some of the participants’ more casual language repertoire, but also [suggests] that some of the participants might use XSV more actively as part of a linguistic strategy with which they may manifest their solidarity with their peers”47. At the same time, this peculiar idiom has developed in other suburbs. Near Gothenburg (the second biggest city in Sweden) and Malmö (the third biggest city), two multi-lingual areas have rapidly developed since the 80s: Angared and Rosengård respectively. As rinkebysvenska refers to the district of Rinkeby, so rosengårdsvenska refers to Rosengård. However, the words invandrarsvenska and blattesvenska are used more generally, without any geographical distinctions. 48 Invandrarsvenska had only aroused interest in the linguistic and social fields of study, until the publication of Leiva Wegner’s Till vår ära and Khemiri’s Ett öga rött. Subsequently, it became a literary matter too. With these two works, the already popular invandrarlitteratur started to use the invandrarspråk as an aesthetic device. Nonetheless, many literary critics still defined the language used by the two authors as a realistic representation of multi-ethnic language. But what does invandrarlitteratur mean? What is an invandrarförfattare? Natalia Ganuza, “Subject-Verb Order Variation in the Swedish of Young People in Multilingual Urban Areas”, in Multilingual Urban Scandinavia, ed. Quist & Svendsen (Boston: Multilingual Matters, 2010), 47. 47 Ganuza, “Subject-Verb Order Variation”, 48. 48 Bassini, “Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi”, 116. 46 30 2.2 INVANDRARLITTERATUR AND RACISM In a society that describes itself as a multi-ethnic reality, like the Swedish one, considerable importance is given to culture produced by minorities. The invandrarlitteratur represents this tendency in the literary field. Invandrarlitteratur simply means ‘literature of the immigrants’ and it collects “writers with immigrant backgrounds [who] often – although by no means always – deal with topics related to their experience of immigration, with the meeting of cultures, and with majority society seen from the margins.”49 Theodor Kallifatides can be taken as an example: he moved from Greece to Sweden in 1964, when he was twenty-six, and five years later he published his first book, a collection of poems in Swedish. 50 He is now a very prolific and popular writer who has addressed a large variety of themes and settings – as Ingeborg Kongslien notices, Kallifatides has written only a few books that portray immigrants entering Swedish society. Nevertheless he laments in his book Ett nytt land utanför mitt fönster51 (A new land outside my window) that after many years and books in Swedish he is still labeled as an invandrarförfattare. All his books are written in the finest Swedish, which he learned to master reading classic Swedish literature, and which represents his will of integration. A second generation of invandrarförfattare (immigrant author) has started to publish their works in the last decade. These writers differ from their predecessors Ingeborg Kongslien “Migrant or multicultural literature in the Nordic countries”, in Nordic Voices, Literature of the Nordic Countries, ed. Jenny Fossum Grønn (2005), accessed April 20, 2013, http://www.eurozine.com/pdf/2006-08-03-kongslien-en.pdf. 50 Bassini, “Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi”, 112. 51 Theodor Kallifatides, Ett nytt land utanför mitt fönster (Stockholm: Albert Bonniers förlag, 2001). 49 31 basically because they were born in Sweden (or at least they came to Sweden as children, e.g. Leiva Wenger and Marianeh Bakhtiari, or were adopted by a Swedish family, e.g. Astrid Trotzig). Jonas Hassen Khemiri belongs to this second group. His fiction is about characters who seem to be dealing with conflicting influences: they are torn between their familiar roots and their Swedish upbringing. To make his work even more original, Khemiri wrote Ett öga rött in a peculiar kind of Swedish, which appears to imitate the invandrarsvenska. In 2003, the publishing house Norstedts launched Ett öga rött as the first novel written in rinkebysvenska. Critics warmly welcomed the book, suggesting that it was time for multi-ethnic Swedish to have its literary debut.52 Källström analyses thirty-two reviews of Ett öga rött in his essays “Flygande blattesvenska” and “Multiethnic youth language in reviews of the novel Ett öga rött.”53 In all the reviews the language used by Khemiri proves to be a central issue; most of them consider it as a “realistically rendered multi-ethnic youth language.”54 However, reviewers have used many different definitions to refer to this language: rinkebysvenska, blattesvenska, invandrarsvenska, bruten svenska (Broken Swedish), nysvenska (New Swedish), förortssvenska (Suburban Swedish), and konstruerad svenska (Constructed Swedish). 55 Apart from the last one (which has been used in only three reviews), all these definitions connect the language in Ett öga rött directly to the real one spoken by young people who live in multi-ethnic suburbs. Källstom, “Litterärt språk på tvärs”, 147. Roger Källström, “Flygande blattesvenska”, and Roger Källström, “Multiethnic youth language in reviews of the novel Ett öga rött”, in Young Urban Swedish. Variation and Change in Multilingual Settings, ed. Källström & Lindberg (Gothenburg: Intellecta Inflog, 2011), 125-146. 54 Källström, “Multiethnic youth language,” 129. 55 Källström, “Multiethnic youth language”, 130, Table 1. 52 53 32 Another writer who is considered to belong to the second generation of invadrarförfattare is Astrid Trotzig. She was adopted from Korea when she was only five months old. As she writes in her essay “Makten över prefixen” (The Power of the Prefix), critics pay attention to her first of all because of her ‘exotic’ origin.56 Magnus Nilsson’s analysis of Trotzig’s essay highlights how the invandrarlitteratur category tends to be both ‘discriminating’ (because it focuses only on certain ethnicities) 57 , and ‘homogenizing’ (because it does not pay attention to basic differences among writers)58. The definition of invandrarlitteratur itself has become implicitly problematic, because it now defines writers who are not really immigrants: the law says they are Swedish citizens; they are Swedish; they may even have been born in Sweden; however, their names and/or their appearance still make them invandrare.59 Motturi argues how even the language of the critics sometimes reveals the racist structure of this classification: Andra gånger är kritikern uppslukad av den etnotistiska strukturen. Nils Schwartz recension av Jonas Hassen Khemiris roman Montecore, är kanske lite väl tydlig när han hävdar att Khemiri inte är någon ’fullblodsblatte’ eftersom han har en ’tunisk far och svensk mor’. 60 (Other times the critic is absorbed by the ethnic-centred structure. Nils Schwartz’s review on Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s novel Montecore, is maybe a little too clear when he claims that Khemiri is not like a ‘pure blood blatte’ because he has a ‘Tunisian father and a Swedish mother’) Astrid Trotzig, “Makten över prefixen”, in ed. Matthis, Orientalism på Svenska (Stockholm: Ordfrotnt, 2005), 106. 57 Magnus Nilsson, “Literature and Diversity”, in Inter: A European Cultural Studies: Conference in Sweden 11–13 June 2007, ed. Fornäs & Fredriksson (Linköping: Linköping University Electronic Press, 2007), 444; and Trotzig, “Makten over prefixen”, 107-108. 58 Nilsson, “Literature and Diversity”, 444; and Trotzig, “Makten over prefixen”, 109-110. 59 Aleksander Motturi, Etnotism. En essä om mångkultur, tystnad och begäret efter mening (Gothemburg: Glänta Produktion, 2007), 29. 60 Motturi, Etnotism, 63-64. 56 33 Despite the fact that Schwartz was being ironic, his words show how multi-ethnic Sweden may reveal a rotten core, because “people have reinvented race as a social or cultural rather than a physiological entity.” 61 In Ali Fegan’s article “Dom tar våra ord” (They take our words), the author smartly asserts that critics have a Swedish middle-class background and actually ignore the suburbs and language use in them. Due to an exaggerated openness towards other realities, which Fagan calls “friendly racism” 62, invandrarförfattare are sometimes over liked and their works are taken as accurate social and sociolinguistic reports. The overall impression is that all the writers who are defined as invandrarförfattare are stereotyped, and that their heterogeneity is inexplicably turned into homogeneity. Their works are thus necessarily seen as an expression of their non-Swedish roots, and the truthfulness of their fiction is guaranteed only by their ‘foreign’ origins. 63 For these reasons critics considered Khemiri’s Ett öga rött a reliable report-story and, with it, its language an authentic multi-ethnic youth slang. 2.3 LANGUAGE IN ETT ÖGA RÖTT Halim is the main protagonist in Ett öga rött. He is a fifteen year-old Arabic-Swedish boy, who, after his mother’s death, moves with his father, Otman, from Skärholmen 61 Walter Benn Michaels, The Trouble with Diversity (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2006), 16-17. Ali Fegan, “Dom tar våra ord”, Arena 5, 2004, 40-43. 63 Källström, “Multiethnic youth language,” 128: “A recurrent target of criticism is the tendency of literary critics to let the authors’ biography become their main characteristic, overshadowing their work and establishing readings of their texts as realistic renderings of life, people and language in the multilingual suburbs”. 62 34 (a multiethnic neighbourhood to the south of Stockholm, twelve kilometers away from the city centre) to Södermalm (nowadays a more ‘homogenous’ Swedish district of central Stockholm). Otman thinks this will help his son to integrate better into Swedish society. Halim starts to rebel against his dad, his school 64 , and the society that tries to svennefiera (‘Swedify’) him. He becomes a rebel and finds support from an old Arabic lady, Dalanda. She is the one that gives Halim a diary in which he writes – Ett öga rött is the diary written by Halim. In addition, Dalanda thinks that the Swedes have a radical “integration plan”, and Halim gradually shares her idea until he starts seeing evidence of it everywhere. Halim thinks that a way to fight this ‘swedification’ is to write his diary using a very special variety of Swedish. The book opens with this sentence: I dag det var sista sommarlovsdagen och därför jag hjälpte pappa i affären. (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 9) (Today was the last day of vacation and so I helped daddy in the shop.) 65 This passage offers two clear examples of what is called rak ordföljd efter fundament. The correct alternative would be “I dag var det sista sommarlovsdagen och därför hjälpte jag pappa i affären.” Halim uses non-inversion in all the contexts where inversion is used in proper Swedish. Standard Swedish is used only to report dialogues among monolingual Swedes, when Halim talks with Swedes and, finally, Almost only Swedish looking Swedes attend his new school: “Blattarna på skolan är inte så många” (Immigrants at school are not so many) Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Ett öga rött (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2003), 37. 65 Translation is mine, if not mentioned otherwise. Since I find extremely difficult to reproduce Khemiri’s style and since I ignore any immigrant socio-dialect in English, I will simply translate quotations in standard English to make my analysis intelligible. 64 35 when a dialogue in Arabic is translated into Swedish. Only one exception could be found: Den värsta möjliga gruppen (trodde jag). (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 102) (The worst possible group (I thought)) However, this is defined by Källström as “sannolikt en lapsus av författaren” 66 (probably a lapsus by the writer), because according to Halim’s linguistic logic it should have been “jag trodde”, which would represent for the umpteenth time a rak ordföljd efter fundament. Besides this, non-inversion is used throughout the book. On occasion, Halim uses slang words, such as guss 67 (instead of flicka/tjej, in English girl/young woman). He even distorts and manipulates many idiomatic expressions, producing interesting effects, for example when he writes that Dalanda became “eld i lågor” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 30), while he should have written ‘eld och lågor’, which idiomatically means ‘aflame, very enthusiastic’ (literally ‘fire and flames’). Furthermore, Halim spells some words wrongly or writes adjective plus noun combinations as one word, creating neologism, as in: “svårord” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 28) instead of ‘svåra ord’ (difficult words). As well as this, Källström has observed that the adverb också (also) is used in clause-initial position,68 which is not possible in standard Swedish.69 The following is an event narrated in the book, which can be used as an example of how Halim uses his language to discredit Swedish culture. One day Nourdine, Källström, “Litterärt språk på tvärs”, 152. E.g. Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 28, when the word guss is used in plural form: “när gussar ska föda barn”. 68 Like in the sentece: “Också en annan gång han spelade kebabsförsäljare...” Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 30. 69 Källström, “Multiethnic youth language”, 128. 66 67 36 Otman’s friend, asks Halim and his father to help him with a theatre play for which he wants to audition. The play is Peer Gynt, one of Henrik Ibsen’s most famous plays. When Halim calls it Per Gynt, a first falsification is made. Halim adds: “Jag tycker Per Tönt var bättre namn” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 28) (I think Per Jerk was a better name). He defines the language of the play as ”tjockt skumt” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 28) (very weird) and with these words he tells Peer’s story: Pjäsen verkade fett konstig. Per-tönten raggade lite på några gussar och hängde runt med trollfamilj och träffade en snubbe som hette Böjgen (nej inte bögen). Sen han var på sjön och i öknen och i sluted han kom hem som gubbe och ångrade allt han gjort i livet. (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 29) (The play looked super strange. The jerk Per chased after some chicks and went around with his troll-family70 and met a dude that is called the Böjg (no, not the fag71). Then he was at the sea and in the desert and at the end he came home like an old dude and regretted all he had done in life.) When Nourdine recites some verses for his friend, Halim says he does his best with a svennetollfall (the intonation of a svenne) but at the end he confides to his diary that many other roles would have been better for Nourdine than “att spela flummig norrman som heter Per” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 30) (to play a fuzzy Norwegian that is called Per). Halim lists some old performances of Nourdine’s: he has appeared as a taxi driver in a short movie and as a kebab seller. According to Halim, he should perform roles suitable for immigrants and not perform as a Norwegian man. In this instance, Halim shows how the world he describes and believes in is strictly divided into two groups: svennar and blattar, and the one is necessarily against the other. By 70 In his journey, Peer Gynt meets the daughter of the king of trolls, who wants to marry him. A good translation is here impossible. The Bøjg is a troll of the Scandinavian mythology, and one of the characters in Peer Gynt. His name sounds like bög, which means gay/fag in Swedish. It was impossible to reproduce the assonance without changing the name of Ibsen’s character. 71 37 ridiculing Peer Gynt, he wants to defy the authority that such a play implies – with his sexist, homophobic, and gross language, Halim wants to dissociate himself from the Nordic culture which he feels does not represent him. On three occasions, Halim hints that he can actually speak Standard Swedish: 1) ”jag använde töntigaste svenneton” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 165) (I used the most dumb svenne tone) 2) ”Först jag använde vanliga snacket och sen för att ingen skulle misstolka jag puttade in lite svenneton.” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 229) (At first I used the usual talk and then so that nobody would misinterpret I put in some svenne tone) 3) Såklart jag skrev brevet på finaste svenskan (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 235) (Obviously I wrote the letter in the most elegant Swedish) Not only can Halim speak good Swedish, but he even knows in which contexts he has to use it. Thus, his broken language seems to be a way to represent himself, or at least the idea he has of himself, and to create his own identity. When his father finds the diary (i.e. Ett öga rött), he angrily asks his son why he is writing in that way, and Halim answers: “Vill du att jag ska snacka svennesnack? Jag vet i alla fall vem jag är och var jag kommer ifrån” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 215) (Do you want me to talk svenne talk? I know anyway who I am and where I come from). Halim’s language and history seem – at this point – to reflect the blattesvenska and the socio-linguistic context described above. Although rinkebysvenska does not seem an appropriate definition, since the protagonist has never lived in Rinkeby, Halim’s language does share many characteristics of blattesvenska: non-inversion is 38 always used; many non-Swedish words and expressions belong to the protagonist’s register; Halim actively chooses his idiom to define himself and to disassociate himself from whatever he considers Swedish. He willingly writes his diary in a broken language that could be considered blattesvenska. But is it truly so? Does Ett öga rött truly represent a realistic report of multi-ethnic youth dialect? The protagonist himself suggests doubt about his authenticity when at one point he refers directly to the reader: Kanske du som läser texten bara tycker den är fett flummig. Vad kan jag säga? Jag skriver ärlig och om du hellre vill läsa falskhet du kan läsa annan text av töntsvennefilosof. Dessutom om du tycker, jag svär jag bajsar på dig (och hela din släkt). Jag äger dig! PS: Nu det är lite senare. Vill förklara så du fattar: Jag tänker det är viktigt man är riktig, och på samma sätt man måste tänka när man skriver. Men samtidigt visst, jag erkänner jag skriver into om ALLT. Till exempel jag skriver inte så mycket om runkishar. Inte för jag skäms utan mera för det skulle mest bli text om runka hela tiden. PS2: Ännu lite senare. Vill bara säga sista sak innan jag somnar: Du vet det där som jag skrev om larmet i parabolbutiken? Egentligen det var inte riktigt totalt hundrasant eftersom dom inte hade riktiga larm. Bara såna där fejklarmbågar vid utgången. Men om dom hade haft riktiga larm såklart jag skullle gjort det jag skrev. (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 80-81) (You that read this book maybe think that it is totally fuzzy. What can I say? I write straight and if you’d rather read falseness, you can read another book by a dumb svenne philosopher. And if you think this, I swear I shit on you (and all your relatives). I own you! PS: Now it is a bit later. I want to explain so you understand: I suppose it is important that one is authentic, and likewise one has to think when they write. But at the same time I confess I don’t write about EVERYTHING. For example I don’t write so much on jerking off. Not because I’m ashamed but more because it would turn out to be mostly a book on jerking off. PS2: Still a bit later. I wanna only say one last thing before I fall asleep: You know that thing that I wrote about the alarm in the electronic shop? It was actually not one hundred percent truthful because they did not have a real alarm. Only a fake alarm-column near the exit. But if they had had the real alarm, I would have done what I wrote for sure.) 39 Halim suggests that he believes in truth, but he also admits he cannot always be sincere. He even confesses that he had to exaggerate in one of the episodes he wrote about, in order to give it a deeper meaning. Since the readers may, consequently, start doubting the narrator’s reliability, should they not also start questioning whether his language is as sincere and realistic as it appears to be? This short excerpt has been taken as a declaration of authenticity of invandrarlitteratur; 72 however, Magnus Nilsson suggests that “Halim’s ideal of authenticity is constantly described ironically and parodically” 73. It is important to realize that the author and his character are not on the same level and must not be confused, in spite of the fact that Halim writes in the first person singular. Two distinct questions naturally emerge: what is the protagonist trying to tell the readers with his peculiar style? What is Khemiri telling us by using Halim’s idiolect? And also: how reliable are Halim’s narration and language? Some effort has been made by the scholars Julia (Große) Prentice and Roger Källström to analyse Halim’s idiolect in depth. In the following I will summarize their points of view in order to support the idea that that the language in Ett öga rött has mainly aesthetic and literary implications, notwithstanding that it could have been inspired by the real socio-linguistic context, and that the novel does not primarily want to depict a real multi-ethnic youth slang. Wolfgang Behschnitt & Thomas Mohnike, “Interkulturelle Authentizität? оberlegungen zur ‘anderen’ иsthetik der schwedischen ‘invandrarlitteratur’”, in Über Grenzen : Grenzgänge der Skandinavistik : Festschrift zum 65. Geburtstag von Heinrich Anz (2007): 79-80. 73 Magnus Nilsson, “Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’ and the Construction of Ethnicity”, TijdSchrift voor Skandinavistiek 31 (2010), accessed February 20, 2013, http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/tvs/vol31/nr01/art09. 72 40 2.4 JULIA GROßE’S “A COMPARISON BETWEEN REALITY AND FICTION”74 Julia Große (now Julia Prentice) is a lecturer of Swedish as a second language at the University of Gothenburg. Her PhD dissertation shows a deep interest in conventionalized expressions (even called idiomatic expressions) and figurative word combinations in second language acquisition. Her work is based on a project named Språk och språkbruk bland ungdomar i fleraspråkiga storstadsmiljöer (Language and Language Use among Young People in Multilingual Urban Environments). I will refer to this project with the acronym SUF from now on. SUF collects data from 222 students from multilingual high schools in Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö.75 The idiomatic expressions used by eight of these students have been compared by Große to some of those used by Halim in Ett öga rött,76 and to standard Swedish expressions. While native speakers do not train the creative potential of their language,77 second language learners tend to experiment with more linguistic, lexical, and pragmatic possibilities. Indeed they often create new figurative word combinations that could be either approximate versions of the standard ones or simply contaminated versions. Here some examples are taken from Ett öga rött: Julia Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, in På rak sak. Om ordförbindelser och konventionaliserade uttryck bland unga språkbrukare i flerspråkiga miljöer, by Julia Große (PhD diss., University of Gothenburg, 2010). 75 The project was funded by the Riksbank and carried on by the universities of Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Lund. 76 Only the idiomatic expressions used in the first five chapters have been taken into consideration. 77 Alison Wray, Formulaic language and the lexicon (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 11. 74 41 Fast egentligen maskinen bara stod på Nourdines rum och samlade på damm. (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 10)78 (Though the machine was actually only in Nourdine’s room and collected dust on.) In Swedish, one can say att samla damm (to collect dust) referring to those things that are not used for a long time and therefore have been forgotten. In contrast, here the preposition på is used, when not needed. However, the preposition must be used when one wants to say att samla på something. This is an example of ‘wrong’ contamination between a conventionalized expression and a normal use of the language.79 In the following extract a lexical difference occurs between the idiomatic expression and Halim’s words: […] jag var oskyldig som värsta lamm. (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 19)80 ([...] I was innocent like a real lamb.) The expression att vara oskyldig som ett lamm (to be as innocent as a lamb) is obviously used to describe somebody who is completely innocent. Here the use of the word värsta (worst, which may mean riktig, real, in colloquial Swedish) implies a lexical difference from the standardized expression. We can say that Halim’s combination is an approximate version of the standard one.81 78 Italics is mine. Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 115 and 122. 80 Italics is mine. 81 Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 115 and 122. 79 42 When comparing the data from the novel and the data from the SUF project, Große realized that the former are less complex than the latter.82 She observes that “Liksom huvudpersonen Halim i Khemiris roman avviker de åtta informanterna i SUF projektet i sin användning av fraseologiska enheter från det standardspråkliga referensmaterialet men på ett delvis annorlunda och mer komplext sätt” 83 (The eight sources of the SUF project differ in their use of phraseological units from the standard reference-data like the protagonist Halim in Khemiri’s novel, but in a partly different and more complex way). Große found out that Halim distorts idiomatic expressions on a lexical and grammatical level as the young speakers of the project do, but the latter give them a new pragmatic use while Halim seldom, if ever, does. 84 Consequently Halim plays with idiomatic expressions for a stylistic aim without any practical intentions. This suggests that the narrator deliberately distorts the language. 85 In a previous essay Große had made it clear that “Halimskan är visserligen en idiolekt som konstrueras och används av en enda person, nämligen Halim”86 (Halim’s language is indeed an idiolect that is built and used by one single person, namely Halim). Große’s work distinguishes Halim’s language from any real versions of blattesvenska, underscoring how it only has a literary justification. Halim’s language cannot therefore be considered as a realistic representation of a multi-ethnic youth language. Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 125. Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 126. 84 Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 126. 85 Große, “Fraseologiska enheter på flerspråkig grund”, 129. 82 83 Julia Große, ”Tankesultanen och den symboliska marknaden – Språk och identitet i Ett öga rött”, ROSA 11 (2007): 25. 86 43 Roger Källström, another scholar who has made a similar effort to analyse the peculiar language used by Khemiri in Ett öga rött, comes to the conclusion that it is only a literary version of Swedish, and therefore cannot be considered as a reliable sociolinguistic report, even if it does find inspiration in real idiolects with many sociolinguistic implications. 2.5 HALIMISKA – A LANGUAGE TO FIND ONESELF Roger Källström has studied the reception of Ett öga rött in the Swedish newspapers, discovering that the novel was generally seen as representative of the way young people speak in multilingual suburbs.87 However, he spotlights that Khemiri himself “repeatedly stressed that this main character’s language was representative only of the character himself”88. Källström has paid particular attention to the use of non-inversion in Halim’s language, finding out that it is used in all the contexts where inversion is used in standard Swedish. It differs only when the direct speech of Swedes is reported, when Halim interacts with Swedes, and for Arabic.89 The use of non-inversion can thus be seen to be exaggerated since Halim tries to reproduce blattesvenska rather than actually use it. Each of its linguistic features is overrepresented in the young man’s words, and this suggests that Halim’s use of invandrarsvenska has a very strong symbolic connotation without serious pragmatic aims. Källström, “Flygande blattesvenska”; and Källström, “Multiethnic youth language”. Källström, “Literary Use”, 142. 89 Källström, “Literary Use of Multiethnic Youth Language”, 146. 87 88 44 It should not be forgotten that Ett öga rött is actually a diary written on purpose by a teenager who has recently lost his mother and has moved to a new neighbourhood. In his new school almost nobody is an immigrant and he has lost the certainties of his childhood. Through his writing, Halim endeavors to understand what is happening and who he is. Through his language he tries to define himself as a person. We know that the particular idiolect he uses for his diary is not the one he normally speaks; indeed when Otman finds the diary he asks his son why he is writing so, and if he knows somebody who speaks in that way. 90 His father did not know the fact that Halim could master that language because he never uses it at home. Halim tries to copy the dialect used by young people with a multi-ethnic background, but since every imitation easily turns out to be an exaggeration, Halim invents a distorted Swedish that represents nothing but his own search for authenticity. When he says to his father “Jag vet i alla fall vem jag är” (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 215) (I know who I am anyway) after Otam has found the diary, he means that his language is his way to try and understand who he is. Furthermore, Källström makes it clear that Halim’s language is nothing more than his attempt to show his pride in not being a svenne: Om man ser den konsekventa raka ordföljden efter fundament som ett försök att trovärdigt återge andraspråkssvenska, ter den sig misslyckad. Men om man ser den som en del av Halims medvetna motståndsspråk är den ett lyckat drag. Hassen Khemiri använder ett av de språkliga särdrag som är mest iögonenfallande och känt av svenskar som tecken på utändsk svenska och driver det till sin spets: han låter Halim tilämpa det rätt igenom i de relaterande delarna av sin dagbok. Till bilden av den överspänt dagdrömmande Halim fogas på så vis en språklig dimension i konstruktionen av den ”superblatte” han drömmer att han är. Han tar stolt upp och överdriver medvetet och konsekvent ett av de mest osvenska och 90 “Varför skriver du sådär? […] Vem känner du som pratar så där?” Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 215. 45 stigmatiserade språkdragen som symbol för sin egenart (men bara i lönndom, i dagboken). (Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 152-153) (If one sees the consistent straight word order after foundation as an attempt to reliably reproduce Swedish as a second language, it proves to be a failure. But if one sees it as a characteristic of Halim’s consciously oppositional language, it is a successful trait. Hassen Khemiri uses one of the linguistic characteristics that is most evident and felt by Swedes as a sign of foreign Swedish and exaggerates it: he lets Halim apply it right through the narrated parts of his diary. In this way a linguistic dimension is added to the image of the overstrung daydreamer Halim in the construction of the “superblatte” he dreams of being. He proudly adopts, and deliberately and consistently exaggerates, one of the most nonSwedish and stigmatized linguistic traits as a symbol of his individuality (but only in secret, in the diary). Halim’s language is a private way to find himself a place and an identity. In contrast, blattesvenska is openly used by young people in real suburban contexts to express affiliation and show solidarity. 91 Halim must be seen as a normal teenager who wants to overcome his mother’s death and find his place in society and life. He has significant linguistic resources and he uses them as an act of resistance against his father’s desire to leave things behind. It would be absolutely misleading to consider his language involving a desire to affiliate with a certain group, since he often glorifies himself as a blattephilosopher and a tankesultan (thought-sultan), who is superior to all the other blattar.92 It is apparent, however, that Halim is deceiving himself. In his writing he pretends to be someone he is actually not. He succeeds in deceiving his father who is described as angry and worried on finding the diary – Otam fears that his son has become one of those blattar who speak blattesvenska, which he loathes. Otam is afraid that his plan to help Halim to integrate himself into Swedish society has failed; 91 92 Källström, “Literary Use of Multiethnic Youth Language”, 154. Källström, “Litterärt språk på tvärs”, 152. 46 he furiously asks his son why he thinks that they moved. The father has been deceived, but the reader should not be. It does not matter if Halim himself may seem sporadically deceived by his own performance. The reader has to keep in mind that Halim represents a distorted reality in his diary, even though it feels unquestionably real to the young man himself. The feeling left to the reader at the end of the book reminds us that language can be manipulative, it creates confusion, it gives deformed versions of the truth. Notably, Khemiri himself described his character as someone who “tries to recreate himself through the words that he chooses. Towards the end of the book, we realize that Halim was actually born and raised in Sweden […] and the authenticity of this self-proclaimed outsider is put into doubt” 93. Moreover, in his second novel Montecore, a semi-autobiographical character named Jonas Hassen Khemiri admits his anger towards his publisher, who defined Ett öga rött as the first book written in rinkebysvenska.94 It should be noted that Khemiri has often negated the description of his work as a realistic report of the living conditions of immigrants. While many literary critics considered and advertised Ett öga rött as written in blattesvenska, scholars have demonstrated how Halim’s language and the real blattesvenska differ consistently. Halim’s language is unique, and it could only be called Halimska because it is selfreferring. The invisible racial prejudice that permeates the Swedish world of critique has inevitably influenced the reception of Khemiri’s work. His “exotic” name and aspect have led the critics down the wrong path: they ended up defining his books on 93 94 Lucas, “The trickery of the truth teller”. Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Montecore, En unik tiger, (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2011), 28. 47 the basis of his non-Swedish background. His name has been taken as a guarantee of textual manifestation of ethnic identity beforehand.95 The fact that Khemiri has, by and large, been only and wrongly considered an invandrarförfattare, has meant that attention has been given mainly to his literary style and his message about the formation of identity. This prejudice has restricted the analysis and comprehension of Khemiri’s oeuvre, which in my opinion deals with deeper and more universal topics. In the next chapters I will focus on these matters, and explain why they have wide implications and cannot be considered as only representative of a single ethnic minority. *** Ett öga rött is a Bildungsroman. As Magnus Nilsson argues in his brilliant article ”Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’ and the Ethnic Lens”, 96 Halim’s approach to cultural diversity changes progressively and his psychological growth is extremely important. The sensitive protagonist deals with cultural diversity through the novel, and gradually abandons his conviction that one must be true to stereotypical ideas of ethnicity. While the novel starts with a very inflexible Halim who expects people to drastically choose between cultures, at the end this idea appears, to both the protagonist and the readers, quite unappealing. Nilsson also suggests that the marginal character Alex, a teacher’s assistant, plays a fundamental role in the discussion about authenticity, since he insists in the deconstruction of the opposition Nilsson, “Literature and Diversity”, 445. Magnus Nilsson, “Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’ and the Ethnic Lens”, Scandinavian Studies 84 (2012): 27-58. 95 96 48 between the importance of assimilation and cultural separatism. 97 The struggle that Halim faces everyday at home – Otman strongly believes in assimilation, while Halim stands for ethnic authenticity – finds a symbolic solution towards the end of the novel, when father and son watch the Egyptian version of ‘Who wants to Be a Millionaire?’ together. The compromise comes from both sides: Halim agrees to watch a show which he had already defined as svenne-tv,98 and Otman agrees to watch Arabic TV. Later, Halim writes in his diary that the Swedish and the Egyptian versions of ‘Who wants to Be a Millionaire?’ do not differ too much, and Nilsson considers that “This experience shows that the dichotomy underlying the conflict between Halim and his father has, at least to some extent, been deconstructed.” 99 Furthermore, the novel closes with a very tender reconciliation between father and son which symbolizes a final solution to their conflict. On leaving the restaurant where they have just eaten, Otman picks up a napkin with a sentence written in Swedish and in Arabic – while the Swedish words only mean “Oriental Specialties”, the Arabic words hide a political message: “We will return”. 100 Halim really appreciates the political Arabic message and does not dislike the merging with Swedish, and Otman says it is a beautiful napkin even though it does not hide the Arabic roots of the restaurant’s owners. Nilsson considers this episode particularly significant because it “shows that they have managed to supersede the dichotomy between cultural separatism and integration/assimilation underpinning their Nilsson, “Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’”, 33. “När jag kom hem pappa och Nourdine var klara med repetitionerna. Det låg stor hög med pistegeskal på bordet och nu dom tittade på Vem vill bli miljonär. [...] Istället för att kolla svenne-tv jag tappade ett bad [...]” Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 35. 99 Nilsson, “Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’”, 32. 100 “På svenska srkiver dom ‘Orientaliska specialiteter’ och på arabiska ‘Vi kommer att återvända’” Khemiri, Ett öga rött, 252. 97 98 49 conflict.”101 Halim seems to give up his idea that one has to make a choice between Swedish and immigrant culture, and the novel results in a progressive relinquishing of his fundamentalism of ethnic authenticity in favor of embracing Alex’s idea of individuality. From this perspective, Halim’s use of Halimiska finds a new motivation: we knew that it represents his way to express, through words, his need for ethnic authenticity and desire to fight swedification. His language finds inspiration in the real spoken social-idiolect, but it exaggerates its linguistic traits, as has been shown by Große. With his diary, Halim artificially constructs an identity which is far from being authentic, but which fulfils his adolescent need to give himself a strong and fascinating personality – a riktig tankesultan in his case. The novel symbolically ends when his conflict with his father results in if not a solution at least a truce, and this might indicate that Halim no longer feels the need to corrupt his language since he has accepted his authenticity, which does not require immigrant stereotypical traits. With Ett öga rött, Khemiri firstly places ethnicity in the centre to later deconstruct it and all its elements – among them language and ethnic identity – proving that ethnic identity is often unauthentic because it cannot be prevented from resulting in stereotypes. 101 Nilsson, “Swedish ‘Immigrant Literature’”, 33. 50 51 CHAPTER III – The Unreliable Narrator An Analysis of Montecore While style and language are homogeneous in Ett öga rött, they are very heterogeneous in Montecore: Khemiri’s second novel is written as epistolary correspondence and streams of thought. The author interchanges standard Swedish and a literary approximation of invandrarsvenska which differs from the one used in Ett öga rött. Apart from the story that the novel tells – about a Tunisian immigrant who wants to integrate into Swedish society no matter the cost, about his Swedish son who fights swedification as much as Halim in Ett öga rött, and about a Tunisian friend who may be dead – Montecore implements many metafictional devices in order to suggest that literature, an “autobiography” in this case, is always fictional. With this novel Khemiri aims to undermine the idea of the writer as a truth teller and to firmly make fun of all the critics that expect writers with multiethnic backgrounds to always narrate their own story through their books. The first part of this chapter is dedicated to an analysis of the novel, paying particular attention to the coexistence of different narrators and to linguistic elements. In the second part we shall discuss the father and son relationship that Montecore explores and the problematic autobiographical aspects of the novel. 52 3.1 MONTECORE, A NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS 3.1.1 The style of the novel and the narrators Montecore is an unique epistolary novel. The narrators are three in number but only two of them actively participate in the epistolary correspondence, while a third person interacts with them through the letters that he previously wrote to one of the interlocutors. Their names are Jonas Hassen Khemiri, symbolically named after the author; Abbas, Jonas’s father; and Kadir, a friend of Abbas’s. At the beginning of the novel Kadir writes to Jonas, who has recently published his first novel, about his idea to write a story about his father Abbas who has left his son to seek his fortune outside Sweden. This is the initial input to a close e-mail correspondence between these two men, and Kadir decides to share the letters which Abbas had previously sent him with Jonas in order to be able to reconstruct a more vivid description of his father. What makes the novel even more unusual is that Jonas’s e-mails are never transcribed and his contribution to the novel is visible only when he adds his thoughts in between the lines of the letters that he receives. He also intermittently adds some notes that Kadir asks him to write about the memories he has of his father or about his adolescence. However, in Kadir’s e-mails it is clear that Jonas responds to his friend, but these responses are not included in the text – indeed the second email that Kadir sends to Jonas begins with these words: “Käraste hälsningar! / Tacka ditt effektivt levererade svar!” (Khemiri, Montecore, 28) (“Dearest greetings! / 53 Thank your effectively delivered answer!” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 17) 102 implying that a hypothetic answer from Jonas to Kadir’s first letter should exist. Aside from the e-mails and Jonas’s comments and his memories, Montecore also contains some pages written by Kadir about different episodes of Abbas’s life.103 This variety of forms, which is typical of the Swedish contemporary novel, 104 is determined however by its epistolary construction. Since an epistolary novel does not need an extradiegetic narrator, the events appear more realistic (as was true in Ett öga rött, where Halim was responsible for telling his own story without any mediator),105 and this realism has an important function, as we shall see. Indeed in epistolary novels, confessional writings, diaries, and autobiographies the narrator is homodiegetic, or in this case the narrators are homodiegetic.106 The use of different narrators aims to change perspective, or point of view, and this is used by the author to give as much information as possible about the story which he intends to narrate. 107 Khemiri also uses the narrators to convince the readers about the unreliability of what they are told, and this distrust reaches its climax when Jonas wonders whether Kadir is actually his own father in disguise. In one of Kadir’s letter, 102 English translation by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Rachel Willson-Broyles, trans., Montecore. The Silence of the Tiger (New York: Knopf, 2011). 103 These brief stories are called by Kadir himself as Word-documents and give to the book a stronger sense of realism since they appear as documents attached to his mails, Montecore, 15. 104 In the last years many Swedish writers have brilliantly experimented the flexibility of the novel as a genre of narrative possibilities. Per Olof Enqvist’s novel for instance mix the story with the narration of the writer’s efforts to find evidence and sources for his story. The same kind of narration also characterizes Göran Rosenberg’s works. This flexibility finds however its root in the novel-genre itself, which, as Brioschi and Di Girolamo argue, “si rifrange in una molteplicità di generi e sottogeneri straordinariamente plastici, richiedendo al lettore una disponibilità ad assumere attitudini diverse quale nessun altro genere di discorso pretende da lui.” Brioschi, Di Girolamo, Elementi di teoria letteraria, 194-195. 105 “Un’altra caratteristica, da sottolineare, della narrazione romanzesca è la sua compatibilità con vari tipi testuali, come la lettera, il libro di memorie, il diario, ecc. Si tratta cioè di tipi extra-letterari di cui la narrativa si è servita, in epoche antiche e moderne, per evitare l’artificialità della narrazione “dall’esterno” e per costruire quindi una finzione di realismo.” Brioschi, Di Girolamo, Elementi, 167. 106 Bernardelli, Ceserani, Il testo, 77. 107 Bernardelli, Ceserani, Il testo, 80. 54 we come to understand that Jonas has found his friend’s writing style too similar to his father’s style: “[du] anklagar plötsligt din fars breviska skrivstil för att vara ”misstänkt lik” min?” (Khemiri, Montecore, 112-113) (”you suddenly accuse your father’s letterish writing style of being “suspiciously like” mine?” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 92). Kadir explains that Abbas’s letters were of course written in Arabic and that he had to translate them into Swedish, therefore it is understandable that Jonas could actually think that they were written by the same person. Kadir also reaffirms his honesty but also admits that Abbas’s “brev inte stått HELT objektiv från min influens” (Khemiri, Montecore, 113) (“letters are not ENTIRELY objective from my influence” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 93). The whole novel could apparently be considered as Abbas’s attempt to get in touch with his son, using the name of an old friend. In fact Kadir knows a lot about Jonas’s life and strenuously defends Abbas’s decisions, and this could make the readers think that Jonas’s father is actually behind Kadir’s e-mails. Even in the epilogue of the novel Kadir insists one last time about his reliability, but at this point his attempt is pointless because Jonas has apparently done some research, finding out that his father’s friend killed himself many years before. (Khemiri, Montecore, 358) Thus, all the e-mails and the texts that he received from Kadir were in all probability sent by his father who wanted to exonerate himself and justify the fact that he had abandoned his family. In spite of this ambivalence, the alternation Kadir-Abbas bears a strong meaning throughout the narration, since it reminds the readers that the whole novel is constructed upon the idea that the narrators are not as reliable as they pretend to be. Even Jonas’s words are sometimes negated by Kadir. This happens for example when Jonas recalls the day when Abbas came back to Sweden after a long time spent in Tunisia. Abbas 55 apparently interrupted a reunion of Jonas and his friends, but while Jonas asserts that “ett stort gäng” (Khemiri, Montecore, 325) (“a big gang” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 278) came, Kadir corrects his words saying: “Men Jonas… INGEN HADE JU иNTRAT STUDION! Det fanns inga “trupper”. Det fanns bara du och dina tre förtappade vänner” (Khemiri, Montecore, 328) (”But Jonas... NO ONE HAD INVADED THE STUDIO! There were no ”troops.” There were just you and your three lost friends” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 281). Throughout the story, Jonas always exhibits a strong inclination to invent stories which he cannot later tell apart from reality, and this makes it, of course, very hard for the readers to trust him as a narrator. Thus, it results that none of the narrators are completely dependable and the story seems to be more a complex web where real facts and imagination intertwine, than a trustworthy narration. The content of Montecore contradicts its epistolary form, which is on the contrary often used to give an extra realistic façade to novels, thus highlighting not only Khemir’s capacity to play with forms and language but also his aim to undermine the idea of the storyteller as a teller of truth. When the journalist Eva Lucas claimed that Montecore cripples the substance of a writer’s trade in showing that language has scheming components, Khemiri meaningfully answered: “Life would certainly be easier if we could just sit back and trust the words that we are constantly being bombarded with. But at the same time, we are all aware of the manipulative nature of language. Storytelling is always fictional and I guess I’m more interested in undermining than underlining the romantic idea of the writer as a teller of truth.”108 Quotation was originally in italics. Eve Lucas, “The trickery of the truth teller”, Exberliner, February 1, 2010, accessed September 25, 2013, www.exberliner.com/articles/the-trickery-of-the-truth-teller. 108 56 This problem that is within the narration in Montecore could be also considered as the author’s reaction to the reception of Ett öga rött by the Swedish critics. In a letter, Kadir refers directly to the enormous success that Jonas has achieved after his first book, and about the misunderstanding of his intention: “Trots dina protester celebreras du för att ha skrivit en bok på ‘tvättäkta Rinkebysvenska’. Tydligen har du gett liv åt ‘nvandrarens historia’ på ett språk som låter som om man ‘sänker ned en mikrofon’ i valfritt invandrarområde. Skrev du inte att din bok handlade om svenskfödd man som byter sitt språk med intention?” (Khemiri, Montecore, 39) (“Despite your protests you are celebrated because you have written a book in ‘authentic Rinkeby Swedish.’ Apparently you have brought ‘the immigrant’s story’ to life in a language that sounds as though one has ‘dropped a microphone’ into an immigrant area of one’s choice. Did you not write that your book was about a Swedish-born man who breaks his language with intention?” Willson-Broyles Montecore, 27). Khemiri’s attempt to draw his readers’ attention to the unreliability of his narrator was actually already present in Ett öga rött. However, since the critics considered Halim’s language and story to be realistic and reliable, when the author preferred to explore “autenticitetstemat” as Kadir calls it (Khemiri, Montecore, 39) (“the authenticity theme” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 27), Khemiri overstressed the unreliability of the narrators in Montecore. Despite the fact that Kadir and Jonas are effectively unreliable, the implied author does somehow sympathize with them. However, this sympathy is sometimes very hard to define since there is no extradiegetic voice which can imply some 57 comments about the characters.109 As we have said, the points of view are multiple because of the large number of narrators, and this allows the author to tell different versions of the same story. Considering also that none of the versions are more reliable than another, they are all trustworthy and deceiving at the same time, and the author does not give any hint to the readers about which of his characters, Jonas, Abbas or Kadir, is more deserving of our sympathy. The three characters are realistically represented, not because they are inspired by real persons who the author may know as some critics would maybe argue, but because they are depicted with their passions, limits, and virtues. Consequently, it could be that Abbas is a very tender father who cares a lot about his son’s integration into society but he is also an aggressive man who despises the other immigrants. It is also possible, for instance, that Jonas is not only a young man who fights for people’s rights but also a shortsighted teenager who cannot understand the pain that his father has suffered being an immigrant in Sweden. Khemiri presents his characters as guilty victims: none of them truly deserve their tribulations but they are also the cause of somebody else’s pain, and their greatness is only determined by their humanity. 3.1.2 The time issue of the novel Montecore begins when all the events of the story are already over. The reconstruction of Abbas’s story occurs through a dialogical process in which Jonas 109 About the moral consideration that the author can imply through the use of an extradiegetic narrator see: Angelo Marchese, “Latitanza ed epifania dell’autore”, in L’officina, 80-83. 58 and Kadir are the communicative partners, 110 and since their aim is to write “en biografi vigd åt [Jonas] far” (Khemiri, Montecore, 14) (“a biography devoted to [Jonas’s] father” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 4) the sequence of memories appears as a work in progress where the two men try to write down their ideas about Abbas. The novel is divided into five parts, each of which corresponds to a time period: the first part is about Abbas in Tunisia, before he met Pernilla; the second part focuses on Jonas’s first memories of his father; the third part recounts Abbas’s attempts to learn Swedish; the fourth part is about Abbas’s economic success as a petphotographer; and the fifth part is about Abbas’s departure and last period in Sweden with his family. In Montecore, there are two diegetic times which complicate the time structure of the novel. While Jonas and Kadir’s exchange is contemporary and corresponds more or less to the years after the publication of Ett öga rött, Abbas’s first letter was written on February 2nd, 1978 and the last one on December 27th, 1985. However, as we have previously seen, Kadir and Abbas are plausibly the same person, and their narrations cannot refer to two diverse diegetic levels. It is more likely that Abbas faked the letters to make his son, and the readers, trust Kadir’s version of the events. What Khemiri expects of his readers is that they keep alert and mistrust what they are told. As he did in Ett öga rött, Khemiri again intersperses some proof here and there in his novels which the readers must find and use to figure out a story that is more reliable than the one told by the narrator, but at the same time the story is also designed to mislead the readers. In Ett öga rött, the readers were asked to find Angelo Marchese gives a very fine definition of what a dialogical process in narrative is: “il confronto dialogico che comporta la ricostruzione e la comunicazione di un caso, di una vicenda a un partner comunicativo” Marchese, L’officina, 137. 110 59 out whether Halim was actually Swedish and could speak standard Swedish, inspite of the fact that he wrote his diary in Halimiska, and in Montecore Khemiri expects his readers to mistrust Kadir’s innocence and to understand that he is Abbas’s alter ego, even though he labels Abbas’s letters with previous dates. Through a deceiving time structure, Khemiri’s aims to undermine the idea that story tellers can be trusted without a critical and attentive approach by the receivers. 3.1.3 The language A linguistic analysis of Montecore is extremely interesting, not only because the novel employs a new, fascinating sort of invandrarsvenska, but also because the language is one of the most important themes of the novel. From a stylistic point of view, the epistolary form allows the author to use different languages that fictionally represent the interlocutors and their styles. However, since Abbas’s letters are said to be translated by Kadir, and also considering that Kadir and Abbas are very likely the same person, their languages are represented by only one style; Jonas, on the other hand, uses another very characteristic language that is his own. It is thus very easy for the readers to understand which character writes what, since Abbas-Kadir’s style really differs from Jonas’s, and therefore the author is able to insert many comments in between the lines of the reported e-mails, or as footnotes, without risking any misunderstanding. The text switches continuously between the two sorts of Swedish that characterize Montecore, creating a very beautiful linguistic play that really appeals to the readers. 60 As we have said, Kadir and Abbas have Tunisian origins and Swedish is not their mother tongue. Therefore their language is characterized, of course, by the mistakes that a Swedish learner would naturally make, such as semantic or grammatical mistakes. However, since the only language that they know, aside from Arabic, is French, what really distinguishes their language is the massive use of Gallicisms that sometimes has hilarious results. 111 For instance Kadir introduces himself to Jonas as his “fars mest antika vän” (Khemiri, Montecore, 13) (“father’s most antique friend” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 3) using the adjective antik (antique), which exists in Swedish, instead of gammal (old), which is what should be used in this case. Of course the French vieux (FR, old) differs very much from gammal, while antique (FR) is pretty similar to antik, and this explain Kadir’s choice. However, a lot of Gallicisms have actually quite commonly been used by Swedes since the eighteenth century,112 but many others do not belong to the spoken language, although they exist in Swedish. The Swedish audience can indeed understand Kadir, but they perceive his linguistic choices as unsuitable if not completely inadequate;113 nevertheless, Kadir’s language is extremely charming as well, since he constructs many weird but beautiful metaphors and invents idiomatic expressions. When Kadir congratulates Jonas for the publication of his first novel, he asks his friend: “Hur smakar din emotion? Som frasighetens Nutella-crêpes i solig park? Som suprisens nackpuss i somrig syrenlukt? Som vind i hår när man cyklar Bassini, “Chiamalo”, 133. Such as chaufför (FR chauffeur, ENG driver). The spelling is often adapted to the Swedish alphabet and word-construction. 113 The reason why Kadir uses the French language much more than he does with Arabic is of course justified by the fact that very many French words exist in the Swedish vocabulary, and that he wants to give a sense of higher register to what he writes. This also depends on the fact that Khemiri himself can speak and write French, while his knowledge of Arabic is basic. 111 112 61 handlöst nedför broar med solens läggning i siluett?” (Khemiri, Montecore, 39) (”How does your emotion taste? Like Nutella crêpes of crispiness in a sunny park? Like a kiss of surprise on the nape of one’s neck in the summery smell of lilacs? Like wind in hair when one cycles hands-free down bridges with the laying of the sun in silhouette?” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 27). Kadir’s language is therefore not simply the language used by immigrants, but is very finely constructed and often highly poetic. Thus, it is wrong to simply consider Kadir’s Swedish as invandrarsvenska, because he shows a personal inclination toward exploring the playfulness of language which distinguishes his own Swedish. Since we have defined Halim’s language as Halimiska, because it did not properly fit the characteristics of the blattesvenska, we should call Kadir’s language Kadiriska for it does not truly represent the language spoken by immigrants either. Given what we have just said, it is not a coincidence that Jonas calls his father’s way of speaking “khemiriska” (Khemiri, Montecore, 108), implying that its peculiar characteristics define it as a language on its own. Khemiri seems so very interested in the definition of the language that he creates in his works, and he disassociates it from the definition of Rynkebysvenska that many critics have used for his previous novel. In point of fact, in Montecore, Jonas pays much attention to the features that distinguish his father’s language from any others’: […] bara pappor har sitt eget språk, bara pappor pratar khemiriska. Ett språk som är alla språk blandade, ett språk som är extra allt med glidningar och sammanslagna egenord, specialregler och dagliga undantag. Ett språk som är arabiska svordomar, spanska frågeordm, franska kärleksförklaringar, engelska fotografcitat och svenska ordvitsar. Ett språk där g och h rumlar långt ned i magen, där man alltid ska plockas upp från ”marken”. Ett språk där ”daccurdo” betyder okey och ”örtsalt” 62 är synonymt med ”jättegott” (bara för att mammor älskar örtsalt på popcornen). (Khemiri, Montecore, 108) (“[…] only Dads have their own language, only Dads speak Khemirish. A language that is all languages combined, a language that is extra everything with changes in meaning and strangewords put together, special rules and daily exceptions. A language that is Arabic swearwords, Spanish questions words, French declarations of love, English photography quotations, and Swedish puns. A language where g and h rumble way down in your stomach, where you always “walk” abroad instead of traveling, where toys must always be picked up from the “ground.” A language where “daccurdo” means “okay” and “herb salt” is synonymous with “really good” (just because Moms love herb salt on popcorn).” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 88) Jonas lists here some mistakes that the Swedish learners make, as Bassini argues, 114 but he also describes Abbas’s language as absolutely personal, highlighting what makes it unique. There is of course a clear sentimentalism in Jonas’s words, nonetheless this does not imply that he is biased and unable to objectively analyse his father’s language. Jonas, and maybe Khemiri, are much more interested in describing and emphasizes the peculiarity of the khemiriska rather than using it as a reliable example of invandrarsvenska. In other words, Khemiri’s interest in depicting the sociolinguistic implications of Abbas’s broken Swedish goes hand in hand with his stylistic will to construct a language which is very poetical and very unique. Abbas’s inability to speak correct Swedish has many social implications, and the learning of Swedish soon becomes an important issue for the Tunisian immigrant. His wife, for instance, often insists that it is necessary for him to study the language, and in one of his memories Jonas recalls one summer when he helped his father and Kadir to approach the language with a few unconventional language-rules. These rules, which are reported in the novel (Khemiri, Montecore, 203-213), describe the Swedish language through the use of its idiomatic sentences, instead of through mere 114 Bassini, “Chiamalo”, 133. 63 grammatical explanations. Jonas’s rules are very beautiful and create interesting and amusing links between the language and its use of metaphorical expressions, which often refer to nature, giving the idea that Swedish is melodic and delightful. The rules show that Khemiri is actually very curious about also analysing the so called standard Swedish, and his capacity of linguistic analysis is undoubtedly fascinating. However, these rules have the function to give Kadir a first approach to the Swedish language – he has, in fact, at this point just moved to Sweden – and to encourage Abbas to continue with his learning. Besides the romantic description that Jonas gives through his rules, the Swedish language is also a very harmful issue in the novel. In another of his memories, Jonas speaks of the implicit power that Swedes hold over those who cannot speak their language properly. Here is the passage when Jonas describes the sense of control that his father was often victim of: Pappor lär sig allt som finns att kunna. Men ändå. En enda felaktig preposition är allt som behövs. Ett enda ”ett” som borde varit ett ”en”. Sen deras sekundlånga paus, pausen som de älskar, pausen som visar att hur mycket du än försöker kommer vi alltid, ALLTID att genomskåda dig. De njuter av maktövertagandet och väntar väntar väntar tills precis när pappor tror sig vara besegrad. (Khemiri, Montecore, 239) (”Dads learn everything that there is to know. But still. One single wrong preposition is all it takes. A single en word that should be an ett. Then their second-long pause, the pause they love, the pause that shows that no matter how much you try, we will always, ALWAYS see through you. They enjoy taking the power and waiting waiting waiting until just when Dads think they are defeated.” Khemiri, Montecore, 203) 64 Bassini argues that the word maktövertagandet (taking the power) is highly symbolic and reminiscent of Pierre Bourdieu’s idea about the symbolic power of language. 115 In his essay “Chiamalo come diavolo vuoi” Bassini explains that, according to Bordieu, there is a standardized language which is imposed by the state and that a person’s powerlessness can be measured by how much his way of expressing differs from the norm. This kind of language oppression is not only felt on certain high cultural levels, but at any level of society. 116 At the same time, Montecore does not only deal with immigrants’ language but also with Jonas’s. It might be useful to remember that Jonas was born in Sweden, and is therefore Swedish. His fluency in the Swedish language is not questioned and since his letters are not reported it is quite difficult to analyse directly his way of expressing himself. Besides the fact that the novel reports his frequent stream of thought, it is illuminating to have a look at the comments that Kadir makes sporadically about Jonas’s language. In Kadir’s second letter, there is for instance a reference to Jonas’s previous letter: “Att läsa din positive respons på mina bokliga idé värmde mitt humor (trots din slarviga grammatik och frånvaron av versaler efter punkt). иr ’Wzup dawg?’ en frekvent använd hälsningsfras i dagens Sverige?” (Khemiri, Montecore, 28) (”To read your positive response to my bookly idea warmed my humor (despite your sloppy grammar and the lack of capital letters after periods). Is ‘wzup dawg’ a frequently used greeting in today’s Sweden?” Willson- Bassini, “Chiamalo”, 134-135. “Esiste dunque, secondo Bourdieu, una lingua standard imposta dalle istituzioni, una costruzione squisitamente politico-ideologica, alla quale ogni individuo, in qualsiasi asserzione, è costretto a rapportarsi; e tanto più marcata è la distanza da questo modello, tanto più l’asserzione avrà meno valore, perché sarà percepita come l’appartenenza ad un livello sociale lontano da quello istituzionale. […] la lingua “ufficiale” detiene una valenza di potere simbolico a cui non ci si può sottrarre nemmeno nelle conversazioni quotidiane.” Bassini, “Chiamalo”, 130 and 135. 115 116 65 Broyles Montecore, 17). We can therefore understand that despites the fact that Jonas can speak and write standard Swedish – he also shows it in his long streams of thought, although his Swedish is often infiltrated by hip-hop, English and Arabic117 – he uses an idiolect which does not respect the rules of standard Swedish on purpose. Jonas’s case is therefore similar to Halim’s: his language results in being corrupted not because he cannot express himself but because he decides to corrupt it. Like Halim, Jonas finds Sweden and the Swedish language racist and adopts the idiolect used by second- generation immigrants on purpose; Bourdieu would have explained this with these words: The transgression of official norms, linguistic and otherwise, is, at the very least, directed as much against the ‘ordinary’ dominated individuals who submit to them, as against dominant individuals or, a fortiori, against domination as such. [...] It is clearly among men, and especially among the youngest and those who are currently and above all potentially the least integrated in the economic and social order, such as adolescents from immigrant families, that one finds the most marked rejection of the submissiveness and docility implied by the adoption of legitimate way of speaking.118 As we have already said, the transgression of linguistic norms stands for a clear social rejection. In fact, throughout the novel, Jonas shows in his behavior a strong stance against the status quo, both social and linguistic. After this brief analysis of the linguistic style of Montecore, it is clear that the novel is built upon a multi-layered structure. Each of the languages that are represented in the novel represents a different social group, and apart from the power that is within the standard language – and to which everybody is subdued – Khemiri Ander Monson, “Untamable Tongue”, New York Times, February 25, 2011, accessed April 25, 2013 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/books/review/Monson-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0. 118 Pierre Bourdieu, Language and Symbolic Power (Malden: Polity Press, 1992), 94-95. About the use of this quotation see also: Bassini, “Chiamalo”, 122-123. 117 66 narrates the different reactions of these groups towards the status-quo. In his novel, he implies many ideological and social implications that are within the real usage of these idiolects, and this fact also refers to Bachtin’s idea of heteroglossia (ра реч е), which indicates the conflict of different variations that coexist within a single language.119 According to the Russian critic, a novelist cannot use any of these variations without also implying the strong connotations that they have in real life. 120 So even though Abbas’s language stands only for Abbas – which other immigrant would use so many complex idiomatic expressions and word games? – it is perceived by the readers as real invandrarsvenska, because of the social implication that it reminds them of. In Montecore, Khemiri depicts the idea stressed by Bachtin that language is never uniform, 121 and constructs his novel on the linguistic expression of the “dominated”, as Bourdieu would say, consequently making the heteroglossia issue very evident. However, the languages used in Montecore cannot be considered as trustworthy representations of invandrarsvenska and blattesvenska, because even though writers may use a specific language that is naturally loaded by ideological and social assumptions, they also adapt it to serve an aesthetic and narrative purpose.122 As we have seen, for instance Abbas’s language is from a certain perspective similar to the language used by immigrants – with its frequent grammar and semantic mistakes – but from another it is the result of Khemiri’s linguistic experimentations with Michail Bachtin, “La parola nel romanzo”, in Estetica e romanzo (Torino: Einaudi, 2001), 67-230. “Il prosatore-romanziere non estirpa le altrui intenzioni della lingua pluridiscorsiva delle sue opera e non distrugge gli orizzonti ideologici-sociali (i mondi grandi e piccoli) che si rivelano al di là delle lingue della pluridiscorsività, ma introduce queste intenzioni e questi orizzonti nella propria opera.” Bachtin, “La parola”, 107. 121 “la lingua […] non è mai unitaria” Bachtin, “La parola”, 96. 122 “Il prosatore si serve delle parole già abitate da intenzioni sociali altrui e le costringe a servire le sue nuove intenzioni, a servire un altro padrone.” Bachtin, “La parola”, 107 119 120 67 register, idioms and style – what “real” immigrant would use so many complex idiomatic expressions, word games, and Gallicisms? Although the linguistic complexity of Montecore is profoundly interesting, the readers cannot only focus on this, without running the risk of considering the novel only for its language and not for its story. The relationship between Jonas and Abbas is worthy of the same attention and the reason why Khemiri chooses to give to one of his characters his own name is likewise important. The analysis of these two topics is the aim of the next paragraphs. 3.2 THE THEMES OF THE NOVEL – CONFLICTS BETWEEN FATHER AND SON As we have seen the core of Montecore is the reconstruction of Abbas’s life, which is attempted by his son Jonas and the mysterious Kadir. We have also said that their versions of the story may sometimes differ a lot, and this happens when the two narrators try to defend their perception of what has to be considered really true. From one side, Kadir defends Abbas and justifies his extreme need for integration, from the other side Jonas often accuses his father of submissiveness and supports a certain kind of resistance to swedification. Their conflict however begins when Abbas completely devotes himself to work and when Jonas starts to harbor a deep anger against Sweden as a consequence of some episodes of racial discrimination. However, Jonas remembers his childhood with nostalgia and describes his father with tender words drawing a clear line 68 between a time when their relationship was built on mutual affection and another when it was built on mutual incomprehension. Not only does their discord find roots in their different ideas about integration into Swedish society, but as we shall see also in Abbas’s extreme need for economic success which leads him away from the home. 3.2.1 A different idea of integration From when Abbas first settles in Sweden, he finds opposition at almost every social level. Pernilla’s mother is very uncomfortable with her daughter’s decision to live with a foreigner (Khemiri, Montecore, 96-97) and Pernilla’s friends, who pretend to be extremely politically correct and open, irritate Abbas, treating him as though he was only a representative of Tunisian ethnicity. In the letter dated 15 th April, 1978, Abbas writes: [De] envisas med att ständigt fråga mig om mitt perspektiv på Mellanöstern och min vy av Sadat och... [...] Och varför envisas dom med att ständigt, ständigt påtala mig himmmelskheten i baklavas och djupheten i den förbannade jävla Profeten? [...] Varför vill ingen diskutera annat än Mellanöstern eller baklavas? Varför vill ingen diskutera Otis Redding 123 ? Varför kan vi inte, bara för ikväll, släppa politikens boja, ignorera Afrikas svältande barn och investera vår samlade ekonomi i luxuöst bubblande bål? (Khemiri, Montecore, 94) (“[They] persist in constantly asking me about my perspective on the Middle East and my view of Sadat and... […] And why they persist in constantly, constantly pointing out to me the heavenliness of baklava and the deepness of The bloody goddamn Prophet? […] Why doesn’t anyone want to discuss anything but the Middle East or baklava? Why doesn’t anyone want to discuss Otis Redding? Why can we not, just for tonight, release the chains of politics, ignore the starving children of Africa, and 123 Otis Ray Redding, Jr. was an American soul singer. He is considered one of the major artists in blues. 69 invest our collected economy in sumptuously bubbling punch bowls?” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 75-76) Abbas denounces the Swedes’ tendency to consider him as a mere spokesman of his own cultural background, showing that even those who are interested in Abbas’ background are actually unable to see further than his ethnical origins. In addition, when looking for a job as photographer’s assistant, he experiences resistance because of his inability to speak Swedish, (Khemiri, Montecore, 89-90) and when he finally obtains a place as an assistant to the Finnish Raino, he soon becomes more of a servant than an assistant. Despite the fact that he has always been discriminated against, Abbas describes Sweden as a land of possibilities and Swedes as very nice people , always insisting on his wish to integrate into Swedish society and to be accepted. When, in 1985, Abbas finds out that Refaat El-Sayed, an Egyptian man who moved to Sweden and achieved economic success after buying a small medicine company in 1981, was nominated Swede of the Year by the news-TV program Rapport, he takes El-Sayed as a model of integration, and starts to believe that all those who have a strong will can achieve fortune and integration in Sweden. After this, financial success comes to mean integration to Abbas and since what he craves most is to be considered a Swedish citizen, he will sacrifice his family to become a successful photographer. As we have said, integration also implies the learning of the Swedish language which becomes a fundamental need after the birth of Jonas’s twin-brothers: Pernilla insists that her husband takes a Swedish course in order to obtain a better paid job. (Khemiri, Montecore, 100) However not even a systematic study of the language 70 helps Abbas, who also tries to swedify himself by learning the habits that he recognises as Swedish,124 to emancipate himself. When Abbas understands that even his name can be an obstacle to achieving the integration he craves for, he changes it to the more Swedish Kristen Holmström 125. He subsequently obtains immediate success as a pet-photographer, but the economic crisis of the Nineties and the consequent racial hatred that spreads among the people who regard immigrants as job-stealers, will diminish his happiness. In fact, Abbas’s studio is burnt down and racist slogans are written on the walls, but he cannot understand the gravity of the situation yet, blaming the immigrants who hate those who succeed. (Khemiri, Montecore, 300) At the end of the novel, we have the impression that Abbas’s extreme need for integration has blinded him, and we feel sorry for him, even though he is often depicted by Jonas as very aggressive and intolerant. However, the implied reader helps us to also sympathize with him and his intolerable position as an outsider. On the other hand, Jonas’s fight against swedification in Montecore is similar to Halim’s rebellion in Ett öga rött, involving small acts of disobedience that are often overstated in Jonas’s memories as they were in Halim’s diary. Like his father, Jonas divides the world into two opposite groups: Swedes and immigrants, but he claims to “Jag står till höger i rulltrappor. Jag borstar mina tänder kväll och morgon. Jag avtar mina skor innan jag äntrar lägenheter. Jag använder säkerhetsbälten också när jag sitter i bilars baksäten. Jag börjar snart förstå logiken i att pensionerad släkt ska isoleras på så kallade servicehem. [...]Jag exprimerar troppelt tack varje gång jag investerar en tidning. Jag prutar aldrig i affären. Jag kan diskutera väder och vind i timmar med en meteorologs precision. Varje gång jag är på väg att hälsa på mina grannar hindrar jag mig till tysnad med tanken på ordspråket: En svensk tiger. [...]Om man dinerar på restaurang är jag noga med att kvinnan ska betala sin del av notan. Dom gånger jag insuper alkohol slutar jag inte förrän medvetslösheten är mig nära. Jag exponerar aldrig ilska om någon alkoholiserad svensk på metron råkar insultera mig.” Khemiri, Montecore, 174-175. 125 Krister sounds exactly like Christer, while the last name is the last name is the anagram of Strömholm. Christer Srömholm was a very well-known Swedish photographer. 124 71 belong to the latter proclaiming himself a blatte. However, in contrast to Abbas, who claims integration only for himself and attacks other immigrants, Jonas tries to involve his friends in his rebellion. It is not a coincidence that the word blatte is used for the first time by Jonas in his memories to convince his friend Patrick of the otherness that characterizes him because of his Latin American origins, despite the fact that he has been adopted by a Swedish couple: […] när sluttexterna rullar säger Patrik som av en slump att hans riktiga pappa kommer från Chile. Är det sant? Visst det är sant för Patrik heter Jorge i andranamn och svenska pappan är bara låtspappa och i samma sekund som du hör det inser du att Patrick också måste vara samma sort som du, Melinda och Irman och du säger det till honom, du säger: Men då är du också blatte! Och Patrick tänker efter och kliar sin armbåge och säger: Blatte? Du säger: Visst. Blatte! Och Patrick ler nervöst och verkar inte veta om han ska bli glad eller ledsen. (Khemiri, Montecore, 252-253) (”[...] when the credits are rolling Patrik says as though by chance that his real dad is from Chile. Is that true? Of course it’s true because Patrik’s middle name is Jorge and the Swedish dad is just a stepdad and in the second you hear that, you realize Patrik must also be the same sort as you, Melinda, and Irman, and you tell him so, you say: But then you’re a blatte too! And Patrik considers this and scratches his elbow and says: blatte? You say: Of course. Blatte! And Patrik smiles nervously and doesn’t seem to know of he should be happy or sad.” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 214) Jonas, as much as Abbas, consider the name always loaded with a special value and indicates to which group we belong or we want to belong to. To Jonas Patrik’s second name Jorge is a guarantee of his immigrant origins and this makes him a blatte. In his memories, Jonas often remembers himself as a small leader who fights against discrimination and swedification – which means accepting the racism of Swedish society towards the young Jonas – and even though he is often disowned by Kadir, he still presents himself as a socially committed adolescent. To better 72 understand this, it can be helpful to have a look at one of his memories. Here, Jonas actually refers to himself using the second person singular, as though he is telling himself this memory as a means of remembering it, in order to reconstruct the facts, and not let it vanish: […] i efterhänd är du lite osäker på vad som faktiskt sags men du minns att alla dom där sakerna som du börjat tänka men kanske inte formulerat färdigt plötsligt sprutar ut och du vrålar fiender är fiender och vänner är familj och bröder är brushor och systrar är syskon och vi måste stå strarka och inte låta oss separeras för rassarna blir fler och fler och jävla skinnskallar hänger på helikopterplattan och nassarna äger stan varje 30 november och det är vi mot dom fatter ni inte det!? Det är vit mot svart, det är svennar mot blattar och jag svär den blatte som bråkar med en annan blatte han är värre än värsta Bert Karlsson, vi måste sluta slåss med varran, vi måste enas och sprida kärlek. Och varje gång vi ser en blatte som åker förbi i lyxig Merca, BMW elelr Audi jag svär vi ska aldrig spela svennar och spela avundsjuka istället vi ska bara knyta näven i luften och visa respekt för det rassarna vill allra helst är att vi slåss med varann och det gör vi inte, shit vi ska till och med visa knutna respekthanden om det är en jävla snål selloutirani som kör en Volkswagen Passat, det spelar ingen roll, irani, asssyri, polski – blatte som blatte! (Khemiri, Montecore, 276-277) (”[…] afterward like this you’re a little uncertain what was actually said but you remember that all those things you started to think but maybe didn’t formulate all the way suddenly spray out and you roar enemies are enemies and friends are family and brothers are bros and sisters are siblings and we have to stand strong and not let ourselves be separated because there are more and more racists and fucking skinheads hang out at the helicopter platform and the Nazis own the city every November 30 and it’s us against them, don’t you get it? It’s white against black, it’s Swediots against blattar and I swear any blatte that fight with another blatte, he worse than the biggest Bert Karlsson, we have to stop fighting with each other, we have to unite and spread love. And every time we see a blatte going by in a fancy Benz, Beamer, or Audi I swear we never play Swediots and play jealous instead we just make a fist in the air and show respect because what the racists want most of all is we fight with each other and we won’t do that, shit we’ll even show the fist of respect if it a cheap damn sellout Iranian who’s driving a Volkswagen Passat, it don’t matter, Iranian, Assyrian, Polski – blatte is blatte!” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 235) 73 What must alert the readers is the beginning of this passage: “i efterhänd är du lite osäker på vad som faktiskt sags” (afterward like this you’re a little uncertain what was actually said). Jonas does not remember precisely what he said on that occasion and tries to recall his words giving them a strong pathos and appeal which they probably did not actually have. In the same way that Kadir’s efforts aim to justify Abbas’s decisions, even the most deplorable, Jonas justifies himself, giving an image of his personality that is far from reality but is instead shrouded in an exaggerated charm. Besides this fact, we can still read between the lines Jonas’s idea of integration, which is not based on class consciousness – as Abbas does when he discriminates against poor immigrants and admires wealthy immigrants – but on an ethnic consciousness. As we have seen in the previous chapter, in the Nineties Fascist groups found support thanks to a growing wave of racism which the economic crisis had spawned, and this is the background of Jonas’s youth, when he radicalizes his idea about integration. However, since he often uses the expression “det är vi mot dom” (it’s us against them) we can consider that his concept of integration is contrary to the idea of segregation, which finds no real sympathy in the implied writer. In fact, the author seems to dislike both Abbas’s and Jonas’s ideas, and while the father will go back to Tunisia because his dream of integration has been crushed, so the son will abandon his endless war against Swediots. As we can deduce from one of the first letters that Kadir writes, Jonas has accepted the praise of Swedish society for his first novel, even though he strongly disagrees with their interpretation, and gives interviews to those newspapers that he used to call “fucking jävla borgerlig brackartidning” 74 (Khemiri, Montecore, 39-40) (“goddamn fucking bourgeois philistine newspaper” The Silence, 27). A parallel between Jonas and Halim must be drawn at this point. Because Jonas sees the world as an open opposition of svennar against blattar, he even considers his father as an example of blind integration and his group of friends as a reminder of his ethnical origin. Halim’s perspective does not differ: in Ett öga rött Halim’s father tries to convince his son of the importance of assimilation and Halim’s friend Dalanda is the one who encourages him to adopt a non-Swedish identity. In both stories the protagonists are asked to stand on one side – both Halim and Jonas attack integration and defend cultural authenticity. As we have previously said, Magnus Nilsson considers Ett öga rött a representation of the Swedish belief that reality can be analysed through ethnic lens, since everybody is considered to represent their own ethnicity. 126 Since both Halim and Jonas are immigrants’ descendants but have always lived in Sweden, they have to reject their swedishness and choose to be true to their stereotypical ideas about their ethnic cultures. Consequently, cultural authenticity seems to be the only reasonable one. At the end of both books however, it appears that the protagonists have reached the conviction that only individual authenticity is desirable, finding an alternative to the ethnic lens which focuses on stereotypes and obscures individuality. Nilsson, who argues that Khemiri does not like the idea of ethnicities as pervasive categories, 127 considers that Ett öga rött expounds the idea that “ethnicities cannot be viewed as homogenous and clearly distinguishable cultures 126 127 Nilsson, “Ethnic Lens”. Nilsson, “Ethnic Lens”, 57. 75 that determine every aspect of a person’s identity” 128. The same analysis could be used for Montecore where the extreme alternatives of complete integration or complete segregation are losing and where the readers are left with the feeling that integration into Swedish society cannot be achieved by either of the two methods that the narrators support. The harsh conflict between father and son finds its root in their different beliefsystems, and despite the fact that the implied author suggests that they are both wrong in their ideas, there is no space for reconciliation in the time of the story. However, their incomprehension radicalizes when Abbas neglects his family in order to dedicate himself to his work and Khemiri accidentally describes in his novel an unfortunately common familiar event that the anthropologist Luigi Zoja has called “The Eclipse of the Father”.129 3.2.2 The eclipse of the father In Montecore, Jonas describes his childhood and the relationship with his father enthusiastically, 130 at least until Abbas finds out that Pernilla is expecting another child – who will actually be twin-children. At this point, not only does Abbas’s dream to make money find justification in his ideal of integration, but also in a real and pragmatic necessity. Until now Pernilla has been the one who economically supported the family with her work as a flight hostess, while Abbas worked as a Nilsson, “Ethnic Lens”, 57. Luigi Zoja, “L’eclissi dei padri”, Allegoria 61, Per uno studio materialistico della letteratura XXII (2010): 141-152. 130 Khemiri, Montecore, 102-104. 128 129 76 subway driver. In such a non stereotypical family, Abbas did not have to meet the social patriarchal expectation which considers the father the one responsible for financially maintaining the family. Slowly Abbas changes from a present father, meaning that he is present for his son and provides affection for his family, to a patriarchal absentee father, meaning a father who is merely in charge of economically supporting the family without being responsible for the education of his offspring. It is not by chance that while Abbas evolves from a very caring father to a business man, simultaneously Abbas’s and Jonas’s relationship falls apart, indeed in the novel’s logic blind devotion to work and family happiness seem to be mutually exclusive. It is very interesting to note that as Abbas loses his paternal side, he becomes more and more rigid and aggressive towards his son. Luigi Zoja’s anthropological theory “The Eclipse of Fathers” could explain the reason for this happening. Luigi Zoja notes that the word “father” comes from the Indo-European root /pa/ that means “nutrition, feeding”, and that a male parent is not simply the one who procreates the offspring but the one who also looks after them, feeds and educates them. He finds justification in what he says by analysing men and women’s different sizes: while in other species the male is huge compared to the female – meaning that the strongest individual is the one who can copulate with females and generate offspring – men and women have almost the same proportion. As a result, the father of human offspring is not the strongest but rather the one who takes care of the children, as well as the one who has built a relationship with his partner and his children. When fathers give up this role and give increasing importance to their careers, they instigate a crisis of fatherhood. The distance which develops between the 77 sons/daughters and the absentee fathers often leads to an increased aggressiveness by the latter, who do not want to lose their leadership of the family which they consider their right since they are the providers. Order and teaching within the family are thus reestablished through strength and inflexibility. Zoja’s analysis can help to explain Abbas’s behavior: the loving father becomes progressively the absentee parent who thinks his duty is to guarantee mere economic support. When Abbas realizes that his son has started to think independently and in opposition to his own beliefs, he tries to reestablish his leadership through aggressiveness and pronounced masculinity. While Abbas tends to verbally attack Jonas, Jonas tends to ignore Abbas since he doesn’t recognise his role as a father any longer. To support this hypothesis, one must pay attention to what Jonas writes when he remembers his father’s change. He firstly writes that “Pappor försvinner” (Khemiri, Montecore, 315) (“Dads disappear” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 270) and then symbolically “Pappor blir gasform” (Khemiri, Montecore, 317) (“Dads turn to gas” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 271), expressing the sensation that Abbas was somehow disappearing from the family’s life and relinquishing his paternal role. It is of course significant that in the meantime he overstresses his mother’s presence, “Kvar i Stockholm finns mammor […]” (Khemiri, Montecore, 306) (“Back in Stockholm there are Moms […]” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 263), and his grandmother’s presence, “Kvar i Stockholm finns också världens bästa mormor [...]” (Khemiri, Montecore, 311) (“Back in Stockholm there’s also the world’s best grandma […]” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 266). Moreover when Jonas’s family’s core has been irreparably crippled, he starts to identify his friends as brothers and 78 sisters.131 The pain caused by his father’s loss induces Jonas, therefore, to form a fictional new family with new members, or in other words the disillusion of an unsatisfactory relationship with his biological relatives leads Jonas to seek new and genuine family relationships and he replaces fatherhood with brotherhood. Family should be a metaphorical place where one feels welcomed and protected, and its physical place is the home. The opposition and incomprehension that Jonas feels drives him to find support outside the home: his friends become symbolically his relatives while his father ‘sublimates’. In this way Jonas gives a personal alternative to the crisis of the patriarchal family, undermining the preconception that considers only biological relationships as blood bonds. The contraposition between Abbas and Jonas, which can be seen simply as a conflict between two different ideas of assimilation, may also be taken to represent the dissolution of patriarchal structures in Western society and the alternatives that society has genuinely started to create. In this way the focus switches from the life of immigrants in Sweden to everyday life in Sweden, making Montecore’s message more universal. If readers only read the book as a (more or less) realistic report on integration in modern Sweden, they would concentrate on the exotic and ethnical features and miss every other argument in the story. The definition of Montecore as invandrarlitteratur, in this respect, compromises the disposition of the reader, who expects the story to deal with a certain reality without connections to universal perspectives. 131 “VI иR BRUSHOR FнR FAN” Khemiri, Montecore, 276. 79 3.3 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL LENS Matthew Jakubowski, an American writer and critic who serves on the fiction panel for the Best Translated Book Award, wrote on The National 18th February, 2011, that Montecore is “a deeply compassionate portrait of [the author’s] father” 132. Similarly Charles Harrison Wallace wrote on the website swedishbookreview.com that in Montecore “one of the main threads is an autobiographical account of the author”133. This shows that the idea of Montecore as an autobiographical novel is widely shared and Montecore’s Jonas is widely considered to be Jonas Hassen Khemiri. While the distance between Jonas and Khemiri may not appear to be significant, what makes the biggest impression is that the direct association between character and writer had also previously been done with Halim and Khemiri. Indeed since Halim in Ett öga rött affirms at one point that there have never been any Jewish athletes because money does not help in sports, Khemiri has been accused of antiSemitism by Ragnar Strömberg and Mats Gellerfelt.134 This proves that the critics have always had a tendency to superimpose the protagonist with the author, ignoring a basic rule of literature by which the writer creates his/her characters and gives them a shape that stands on its own. Matthew Jakubowski, “Words of my father: Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s Montecore”, review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, The National, February 18, 2011, accessed May 10, 2013, http://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/books/words-of-my-father-jonas-hassen-khemiris-montecore#page1. 133 Charles Harrison Wallace, “Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Montecore: en unik tiger”, review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Swedishbookreview, January, 2008, accessed May, 12, 2013, http://www.swedishbookreview.com/show-review.php?i=188. 134 Trotzig, “Makten”, 114-115. 132 80 Astrid Trotzig135 considers this tendency of the critics a consequence of their blindness towards those writers who have foreign origins, or bicultural backgrounds. These writers are always expected to explore their double identity and to narrate their real experiences in their novels.136 Trotzig argues that while certain writers can in their works portray both themselves and the world in a universal way, the invandrarförfattare are expected to depict their very personal point of view and no weight is given to their capacity to explore and define society, but only to the ethnic perspective which is only valid for immigrants or at most Swedes with multicultural background. In her essay “Biografi som kategori” (Biography as category), Trotzig argues that the problem within the definition of invandrarlitteratur is that it defines writers by association their biography. 137 While ethnically Swedish writers are valued for their individuality in style and experiences, all the others who have more complex ethnical origins are labeled invandrarförfattare. Therefore each immigrant writer is expected to strictly portray their life in their works because what is considered to be most representative is their background and the critics tend to consider them from this perspective. This explains why Halim has been considered the alter-ego of Jonas, but does not help in understanding the reason why Khemiri deliberately chose to give his name and some of his biographical characteristics to the main character in Montecore. 135 It is worth remembering that Astrid Trotzig was adopted when she is was very little, and she has grown up in a middle-class Swedish family. In her essay she writes about Johannes Anyuru (who is a Swedish poet and whose father is from Uganda and whose mother is Swedish), Alejandro Leiva Wegner, and Jonas Hassen Khemiri. These four writers have extremely different background and stories, but they are still considered as an homogenous group because of their non-Swedish looks. 136 Trotzig, ”Makten”, 112-126. 137 Astrid Trotzig, ”Biografi som kategori”, Pequod 34 (2004): 23-27. 81 The metafictional structure of Montecore suggests that Khemiri wants to explore the reliability of literature. Even if there are no facts that support the idea that Trotzig and Khemiri share the same beliefs, 138 Montecore attacks the largely shared expectation that fictional characters and their writer are biographically linked. To ironically reject this association, Khemiri gives Jonas his name and part of his own history,139 whilst at the same time creating a fictional story that makes it impossible to understand where the line between a realistic autobiography and an invented character stands. We can assert that the most autobiographical feature that Khemiri has given to Jonas – and to Halim also – is his imaginative capacity and his ability to invent stories that may or may not be inspired by reality. At one point Kadir writes: “Förstår läsaren att ovanstående stycken inte är sanningens realitet utan snarrare dina fantasier?” (Khemiri, Montecore, 320) (”Does the reader understand that the above passage is not the reality of truth, but rather your fantasies?” Willson-Broyles, Montecore, 273), and with this question he draws attention to one of the most important features of Jonas, which is his inventiveness. Khemiri recognises himself in this more than in the semi-autobiographical life of his character, using Jonas to highlight his own writing talent. The fact that Jonas has such a creative talent must remind the readers that he is not necessarily reliable, or at least that he is not completely reliable. Thus, since the narrator is not trustworthy, he cannot faithfully represent the actual life and biography of his creator. Trotzig’s essay was published in 2005, while Montecore came out one year later. Khemiri might have read “Makten över prefixen” and be influenced by it. We know however that Trotzig and Khemiri personally know each other, so they might have discuss about this. 139 In Montecore Jonas was born on 27th, December, 1978. Khemiri, the actual writer, was born on the same day. This little detail shows how much attention the writer put on the story, trying to mislead the readers and the critics, pretending that the novel tells his own story. 138 82 Unfortunately a blind belief instigated by the critics has convinced many readers that certain novels tell fully reliable stories, or, what is even worse, that certain fictional characters may directly convey their creators’ ideas and experiences. However, many others have better understood Kemiri’s aim, such as, for instance, the writer Björ af Kleen, who reported a very interesting interview on the pages of the newspaper Sydsvenskan.140 In this interview Khemiri argues that he sometimes sympathizes more with Abbas than with Jonas, for example with his need to be considered as an individual and not just as a representative of his ethnic background –141 Khemiri also feels that he has to fight every day to be accepted as a författare and not as an invandrarförfattare. In this light, Montecore appears as a novel that wants to invalidate readers and critics’ expectations rather than confirm their right to consider Khemiri, and the narrators of his novels, as reliable reporters. Indeed Magnus Eriksson considers Montecore as novel which aims to undermine the autobiographical expectation of the so called invandrarlitteratur, even though this aim runs the risk of becoming lost in the many ironic filters of the novel. 142 Hence, Montecore is a novel that criticizes many of the power structures that are not only within society but also within the world of literature. However, it is also true that Khemiri never gives a plausible alternative to what he deconstructs, and he subverts our perception rather than reinforcing it. But most of all, Montecore attacks Björn af Kleen, ”Hassen Khemiri vill uppfinna sig själv”, Sydsvenskan, February 4, 2006, accessed May 30, 2013, http://www.sydsvenskan.se/kultur--nojen/hassen-khemiri-vill-uppfinna-sig-sjalv/. 141 ”Det är att försvara rätten till självuppfinning. Den rätten är långt ifrån självklar. Pappan i boken kämpar för rätten att få hålla sig fri från sin etnicitet och kultur.” Kleen, ”Hassen Khemiri”. 142 Magnus Eriksson, “En grimas åt alla – och åt ingen”, review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Svenksa Dagbladet, February 6, 2006, accessed May 30, 2013, http://www.svd.se/kultur/litteratur/en-grimas-at-alla-och-at-ingen_32431.svd. 140 83 the biographical lens used by critics to read his novels, proving that Khemiri is not only a fine writer, but also a fine intellectual. *** Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s second novel Montecore deals with racism, integration and assimilation. Moreover, it depicts a father and son relationship which is built upon mutual affection and mutual incomprehension, but this theme has often been ignored by critics who have rather devoted attention to the social issues of the novel. The complex language and the intricate style of Montecore proves Khemiri’s ability to play with the Swedish language and his interest of exploring the numerous paths that literature can offer. Because of its epistolary form and the absence of third person narrators, the novel is experienced as an extreme realistic narration but through many ironical filters the author undermines this perception, and, on the contrary, implicitly supports the idea that narrative, even though semiautobiographical, is always fictional. On a diegetic level, the narrators “fight” against each other to give their own idea of what is real and reliable, and at the same time, on an extra-diegetic level, the implied author “fights” to defend his right to self-invent. Montecore is thus an attempt to support Trotzig’s argument that the definition of invandrarlitteratur is in itself misleading, if not discriminating, because it indissolubly links the invandrarförfattare with their biographies, creating a misunderstanding of their works. 84 85 CHAPTER IV – The Family in a Racist World An Analysis of Jag ringer mina bröder Jag ringer mina bröder143 (I ring my brothers) is Khemiri’s latest novel, published in 2012. After the terrorist attack in Stockholm 2010, Khemiri wrote an article on the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter, in which the narrator expresses his fears and thoughts about the after-bombings.144 This short article was then used by Khemiri as the basis for a more complex novel that came out two years later. The novel was very highly acclaimed by critics, who paid a lot of attention to the political implications of Khemiri’s text.145 At the same time they completely ignored a major topic, which is 143 Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Jag ringer mina bröder (Stockholm: Bonniers, 2012). Jonas Hassen Khemiri, “Jag ringer mina bröder”, Dagens Nyheter, December 18, 2010, accessed August 2, 2013, http://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/kulturdebatt/jag-ringer-mina-broder/. 145 The reviews that have been taken into consideration are the following: Lennart Bromander, “Hög puls bevarar omedelbarheten”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Skånska Dagbladet, October 17, 2012, http://www.skanskan.se/article/20121017/NOJE/710179926/-/hog-puls-bevarar-omedelbarheten; Sinziana Ravini, ”Jonas Hassen Khemiri / Jag ringer mina bröder”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Göteborgs- Posten, October 16, 2012, http://www.gp.se/kulturnoje/litteratur/1.1097163-jonas-hassen-khemiri-jag-ringer-mina-broder; Annika Koldenius, ”Recension: Jag ringer mina bröder av Jonas Hasen Khemiri”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Borås Tidning, October 16, 2012, http://annikakoldenius.wordpress.com/2012/10/16/recension-jag-ringer-mina-broder-av-jonas-hassenkhemiri/; Karin Nykvist, ”Mörkrets alla nyanser”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Sydsvenskan, October 16, 2012, http://www.sydsvenskan.se/Pages/ArticlePage.aspx?id=667633&epslanguage=sv; Magnus Eriksson, ”Platt text om bombdådet i Stockholm”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Svenska Dagbladet, October 16, 2012, http://www.svd.se/kultur/litteratur/platt-text-om-bombdadet-i-stockholm_7584290.svd; Claes Wahlin, ”Om utanförskap inifrån”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Aftonbladet, October 16, 2012, http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/bokrecensioner/article15625805.ab; Johanna Karlsson, ”Jag ringer mina bröder, Jonas Hassen Khemiri”, review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, bokhora.se, October 30, http://bokhora.se/2012/jag-ringer-mina-broder-jonas-hassen-khemiri/. 144 86 the relationship between the protagonist and his friends, showing again that their prejudices towards Khemiri, even “positive” prejudices in this case, manifest themselves in their tendency to recognise only those issues that they expect to be dealt with in the novel. It was obvious that, because invandrarlitteratur is presumed to always deal with politics and integration, the critics have not paid much attention to how friendship and kinship are beautifully depicted in the novel, to its political and existential dimensions. This chapter aims to discuss both the article and the novel, and to highlight some themes which are in the novel but have been ignored by the biased Swedish critics. The chapter also includes a comparison between an open letter eventually written by Khemiri to the Justice Minister Beatrice Ask 146 and the novel Jag ringer mina bröder, for the reason that they present many similar themes. 4.1 BOMBINGS IN STOCKHOLM – FACTS At 16:48 on 11 December 2010, an explosion occurred at the intersection of Olof Palmes Gata and Drottninggatan in central Stockholm. A few minutes later, another bomb was detonated nearby, where a man with abdominal injuries was found; it was I have also taken into consideration the following interview: Stålberg, “Jag skriver för att hitta nyanserna”. 146 Jonas Hassen Khemiri, “Bästa Beatrice Ask”, Dagens Nyheter, March 13, 2013, accessed March 25, 2013, http://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/basta-beatrice-ask/; the article has been translated in Italian by Alessandro Bassini, here is the link: http://lacittanuova.milano.corriere.it/2013/04/15/cara-ministra-per-un-giorno-scambiamoci-la-pelle/; Rachel Willson-Broyles translated the article in English: http://asymptotejournal.com/article.php?cat=Nonfiction&id=47. At the last linked page, one can find the article translated in many other languages (Indonesian, Japanese, Chinese, Dutch etc.) 87 later discovered that he had blown himself up. Despite the fact that the city was filled with a lot of Christmas shoppers, just two people were taken to hospital with minor injuries and the bomber himself was the only fatality. The bombing was immediately considered to be a terrorist attack, and a threatening email sent to Säkerhetspolisen (the Swedish Security Service) and to Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå (the most important news agency) proved the validity of this theory. The email was addressed to Sweden and the Swedish people, criticized the country’s military support in the war in Afghanistan,147 and referred to Lars Vilks and his controversial drawing which depicted Mohammed as a dog in 2007.148 The email contained two audio files, one in Swedish and the other in Arabic, which stated that the Swedish people would continue to die until Sweden ended the war against Islam and the humiliation of the prophet.149 Soon after the explosions, the Foreign Minister Carl Bildt confirmed the hypothesis of the terrorist attack, adding that what could have been really catastrophic had actually failed.150 In addition, the head of the European Strategic Intelligence Claude Moniquet, expressed his concern about terrorist attacks in general, saying that it is difficult to identify lone terrorists before they attack.151 The following day the bomber’s identity was revealed: his name was Taimur Abdulwahab al-Abdaly, a twenty-eight year old Swede of Iraqi origin. At the time of Matilda E. Hanson and Catarina Håkansson, ”Man sprängde sig själv i Stockholm”, Svenska Dagbladet, December 11, 2010, accessed September 3, 2013, http://www.svd.se/nyheter/inrikes/man-sprangde-sig-sjalv-i-stockholm_5802915.svd. 148 Per Nyberg, "Explosions in Stockholm believed to be failed terrorist attack", CNN, December 12, 2010, accessed September 2, 2013, http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/12/11/sweden.explosion/index.html?hpt=T1. 149 Nyberg, “Explosions”. 150 Nyberg, “Explosions”. 151 Julian Borger, "Stockholm bombing: authorities ponder impossibility of policing lone jihadists", The Guardian, December 12, 2010, accessed September 3, 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/12/stockholm-bombing-policing-lone-jihadists. 147 88 the bombings he was living with his wife and kids in England, where he had studied sports therapy.152 A detailed biography of the man, published in Dagens Nyheter by Karoline Hoppe,153 described Abdaly as an extremely normal person. The journalist also reported the shocked reaction of a young man who had played basketball with Abdaly when they were young. Abdaly’s acquaintance described the terrorist’s family as trevlig (pleasant) and “på intet sätt extrema i religiös eller politisk mening” 154 (in no way religious or political extremists). International newspapers wrote many articles about Abdaly’s apparently happy life, publishing pictures of the man with his wife, children, and friends.155 The bomber was depicted by the media as a man who was above suspicion, and this particularly scared people who began to mistrust Middle Easterners in general. Their fear was also fueled by Magnus Ranstorp, a Swedish expert of terrorism, who declared that he did not believe that the bomber acted alone. 156 As a result, the Swedes were afraid that a new, more dangerous attack was about to come and because there was no possibility of predicting attacks, many began to avoid people of Arabic appearance, especially those carrying bags or backpacks, where explosives could have been hidden. One week after the explosion, Jonas Hassen Khemiri wrote a poetic article about this prejudice towards them in the days following the attack, or, in other words, towards the people whose skin is dark enough to be considered terrorists. 152 John F. Burns and Ravi Somaiya, "Police Say Early Detonation of Bomb Averted Disaster in Sweden", The New York Times, December 13, 2010, accessed September 3, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/world/europe/14sweden.html?hp&_r=0. 153 Karoline Hoppe, “Svårt att förstå att det verkligen kan vara han”, Dagens Nyheter, December 13, 2010, accessed September 3, 2013, http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/svart-att-forsta-att-det-verkligen-kan-varahan/. 154 Hoppe, “Svårt att förstå”. 155 E.g. Neil Sears and Nick Fagge, “Portray of a happy family”, Daily Mail, December 13, 2010, accessed August 2, 2013, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1339011/Stockholm-suicide-bomber-familyportrait-wife-parents.html. 156 Nyberg, “Explosions”. 89 4.2 “JAG RINGER MINA BRÖDER”, THE GENESIS OF THE NOVEL On 18 December Dagens Nyheter published an article by Khemiri, which was introduced with these words: “Det har gått en vecka sedan terrordådet i Stockholm city. I dag skriver författaren Jonas Hassen Khemiri om vi och dom, om dom som säger dom – och om vad man ska vara rädd för”157 (A week has passed since the terrorist crime in Stockholm city. Today the writer Jonas Hassen Khemiri writes about us and them, about those who say “them” – and about what we should be afraid of). The article is written from the perspective of a young anonymous narrator and victim of discriminations, and while all media attention was focused on the bomber and on new possible attacks, Khemiri looks at those who are unfairly suspected of being dangerous and constantly have to prove their innocence. The text is the chronicle of a person’s phone calls made after the bomb attacks which shocked Sweden. It is highly poetical, since it is constructed around the anaphora “Jag ringer mina bröder och säger:” (I call my brothers and say), repeated nine times.158 It is unlikely that the calls were actually made by the narrator; it is more probable that the repetition is an aesthetic device to introduce his thoughts and feelings159. So the text is divided into nine parts which describe different perceptions Jonas Hassen Khemiri, “Jag ringer mina bröder”. There is actually an exception in the anaphora. When the words are repeated for the seventh time “säger” is replaced by “viskar” (whisper). The part that follows is the most important of the text and the exception draws the readers’ attention on its importance. The seventh part focuses on the narrator’s fear of being persecuted and discriminated against, and since the narrator is confessing his feelings to his friends, the verb “to whisper” better conveys a sense of closeness and affection. 159 At the beginning it is impossible to understand if the narrator is a man or a woman. This ambiguity aims to remind us that anyone could have said the narrator’s words to his/her friends, and makes the text allencompassing. However, at the end of the text the personal pronoun han (he) is used and we understand that the narrator is a man. 157 158 90 of what had just happened in Stockholm, from a very shocked reaction to an increasing anger towards the new wave of racism. To begin with, the narrator reports the facts and draws a symbolic line between the terrorist’s and his own appearance.160 At this point, he imagines that his friends could become victims of a hostile reaction and asks them to stay at home, or at least to remain as invisible as possible.161 This first part can be considered as a natural reaction of the narrator, who understands that the situation is highly unstable and a single spark would destroy the fragile balance within society. Even if he comprehends the stupidity of the prejudice that some white Swedes hold, he believes that it is preferable to be silent and let time pass. In the central part of the chronicle, the narrator changes his mind and suggests that it is time to fight back, to demonstrate that they are not terrorists and that they are no longer willing to tolerate the public opinion’s prejudice. This new stance results from the narrator’s awareness that they cannot ignore the fact that they are already a part of the Swedish society and that Sweden cannot go back to being an ethnically homogeneous country. On the contrary the tensions within society have to be faced, because they have already become outrageously dangerous – the narrator refers to the cultural centre Cyklopen, burnt to ground on November 29, 2008;162 to the people who shot immigrants through their windows in Malmö; 163 to the fascists “Det hände en så sjuk sak i går. [...] Vissa kommer försöka sammankoppla honom med oss. Hans namn, hans ursprung, hans hårfärg. Tillräckligt likt (eller inte likt alls).” Khemiri, ”Jag ringer”. 161 “Akta er. Ligg lågt i några dagar. [...] Om ni måste gå ut: [...] Smält in, gör er osynliga, förvandla er till gasform. Väck ingens och jag menar ingens uppmärksamhet.” Khemiri, ”Jag ringer”. 162 Mikael Bondesson, ”Brand totalförstörde kulturhuset Cyklopen”, Dagens Nyheter, November 29, 2008, accessed September 2, 2013, http://www.webcitation.org/5cp2Fd4ds. 163 Jens Littorin, Stefan Lisinski, and Andres Hellberg, “Kvinnorna sköts genom fönster”, Dagens Nyheter, October 22, 2010, accessed August 28, 2013, http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/kvinnorna-skots-genomfonstret/. 160 91 who are used to congregate in Salem 164 ; to the radical Islam people in Drottninggatan; and to the extreme right wing party in parliament. The narrator of “Jag ringer mina bröder” writes that the situation is scary and that it has got out of hand. A metaphorical (but not only) war is being fought between white Swedes and dark skinned Swedes, who mutually consider the other group to be aggressive and dangerous, “Alla svartskäggiga män är potentiella bombbärare. Alla blonda män är potentiella lasermän”165 (All men with a dark beard are potential bombers. All fairhaired men are potential ‘lasermen’). At the end of the article, the narrator admits to seeing a suspicious person with dark hair, a face covered by a Palestinian keffiyeh, and an unusually big backpack.166 He then understands that he was looking at his own reflection – the article concludes therefore on a very bitter note: the narrator himself has started to mistrust everybody and has become a victim of the racist system that he would like to fight against. The article results in being a collection of thoughts that lead the narrator from a state of immobility to a strong and active reaction through many conflicting feelings. In addition, the article represents a crescendo of awareness, which leads the narrator to understanding that he is not immune to the racist virus which is contaminating Swedish society. Despite the fact that the article was based on facts, Khemiri was more interested in people’s reaction to the bombings rather than reporting the actual events that had recently upset Sweden. It is clear that the intent of the writer was to explore the psychology of minorities suddenly involved in a silent war between themselves and 164 Salem is a municipality (kommun) in the County of Stockholm. Khemiri, “Jag ringer”. 166 “[…] fick syn på en väldigt misstänkt individ. Han hade svart hår och en ovanligt stor ryggsäck och hans ansikte var täckt av en Palestinsjal.” Khemiri, ”Jag ringer”. 165 92 the white majority, a war that is basically fought with the weapons of mistrust and isolation. Nearly two years after the chronicle, Khemiri published a new novel which is also called Jag ringer mina bröder. From the previous article, the writer developed a touching story whose protagonist, Amor, was presumably inspired by the narrator of the chronicle. Furthermore some verses of the chronicle were used – taken literally or slightly changed – to introduce the five chapters of the novel and to close the narration at the end of the book. Again, the novel focuses on the protagonist’s personal reaction to the bombings and only marginally reports facts. Jag ringer mina bröder cannot be considered as a reliable reconstruction of external events; it is a psychological novel that aims to depict Amor’s paranoiac mind whilst, at the same time, telling the moving story of his friendship with Shavi. 4.3 JAG RINGER MINA BRÖDER, A NARRATOLOGICAL ANALYSIS Jag ringer mina bröder describes a day in Amor’s life after the terrorist attack in Stockholm city centre which upset Sweden in 2010. Amor is Muslim looking and he immediately understands what could happen to people with his skin colour. Therefore he calls his friends and tells them to be careful because they might become the victims of a rage wave. He gives them instructions about their clothes and their behaviour saying they have to be as anonymous as possible. The story develops around these instructions which are actually taken (almost literally) from the article “Jag ringer mina bröder.” As previously mentioned, the novel is divided into five 93 chapters, each of which is named after a person who talks with Amor. Four of the dialogues are real, while one is purely imaginary as the protagonist who talks to his dead grandmother. Not only does Amor imagine this dialogue, but he also describes actions and situations that can only be fruit of his paranoiac mind. 4.3.1 Narrator, voice, and point of view The text takes the form of Amor’s thoughts, consequently, it is often difficult to differentiate between what happens in reality and what actually only happens in his mind. The narration is carried out by the protagonist, making the narration homodiegetic.167 Since the novel is confessional in nature, the principal point of view is necessarily taken from Amor, 168 who describes his own perception of reality. However Amor also reports the dialogues with his friends, giving utterance to other points of view through the narration. The style (short sentences, direct dialogues, and intense streams of consciousness which alternate in the text) enables the readers to identify themselves with Amor.169 In addition, rhythm and silence are very important because they recreate the pace of natural thinking. The narrator issue becomes complicated at one point (in the chapter “Valeria”), when a voice reports Amor’s movements in the form of military communication. Here the story is told twice, by a homodiegetic and a heterodiegetic narrator: 167 Andrea Bernardelli and Remo Ceserani, Il testo narrativo (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 77. ”Punto di vista [...] gli eventi del racconto [che] ci vengono via via rivelati così come sono percepiti dall’esperienza di qualcuno” Franco Brioschi, Costanzo di Girolamo, Elementi di teoria letteraria (Milano: Principato, 1984), 179. 169 Bromander, “Hög plus”. 168 94 Jag kom ut på gatan. Visuell kontakt, kom. Jag gick mot tunnelbanan. Han går västerut, kom. Jag tog fram min plånbok, drog mitt kort och åkte rulltrappan ned mot spåren. Han är på väg ned i tunnelbanesystemet, jag upprepar, han är på väg ned i tunnelbanesystemet, kom. (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 57) (I went out on the street. Visual contact, over. I went towards the underground. He is going westwards, over. I took my wallet, flashed my card and went down to the platform via the escalator. He is going down into the underground, I repeat, he is going down into the underground, over.) It would however be wrong to consider this voice as another “real” narrator, since it somehow represents Amor’s subconscious fears. This second narrator arises in fact from Amor himself, who imagines that he is being kept an eye on. The reader can easily understand that the protagonist has a strong inclination to perceive reality in a very imaginary way, and that he invents stories and conversations that may seem realistic at the beginning, but tend to end in very spectacular or adventurous ways. The reader is then often misled, and finds it hard to understand where reality ends and Amor’s imagination starts. This double narrator serves two different narrative needs: firstly it reproduces Amor’s paranoiac perception of reality, and secondly it represents a message that the implied author gives to the implied reader 170. Indeed, the two narrators tell two different versions of the same facts and this duplication suggests that the readers cannot rely on the narrator, since he often “lies” or at least exaggerates. “[…] là dove manca un narratario, esisterà comunque un lettore implicito a cui l’opera si rivolge” Brioschi, Elementi, 174. 170 95 The parallel narrator who is present in the text has also an ideological function:171 he embodies the widespread mentality which fears Middle Easterners and expects them all to be potential terrorists. A military style is used here, because this portrays people’s need to keep all possible bombers under surveillance, and it also highlights Amor’s fear of being constantly chased. This complicated interaction of different voices expresses the author’s idea that our enemy is sometimes us, and questions whether it is possible to separate our own inner voice from the social expectations that we all bear.172 4.3.2 Time Jag ringer mina bröder not only narrates one day in Amor’s life but, because the main character often recalls his childhood and adolescence in a free association of thoughts, it is filled with many flashbacks. Each conversation, real or imagined, is used to recall the protagonist’s past, giving the reader a wider perspective of Amor’s life. This constant alternation of present actions and memories recreates the natural function of the brain which constantly oscillates its focus between memories and present time. Moreover, the flashbacks are useful in slowing down the rhythm of the main action, which is otherwise very fast-paced. Intertwining past and present time serves to juxtapose the two different realities which are experienced by Amor with contrasting feelings: childhood is always idealized (as it was in Montecore), while “Se l’intervento del narratore nei confronti della storia non è semplicemente esplicativo […] ma prende la forma di un commento dell’azione, di un giudizio autorizzato, si può parlare di una funzione ideologica vera e propria” Angelo Marchese, L’officina del racconto (Milano: Mondadori, 2011), 183. 172 “Vad är den egna rösten? Vad är de andras? Hur hittar man gränsen mellan den egna och andras moral?” Ravini, ”Jonas Hassen Khemiri”. 171 96 the present appears miserable and troubled to him. Time loses therefore its objectivity and is loaded with a personal significance that can only be felt by the narrator – and by the readers who are catapulted into his mind. As Angelo Marchese remarks, it is a typical trait of contemporary literature to interiorize time, which becomes difficult to “measure” and understand only from a subjective, psychological, and ephemeral point of view.173 As Jag ringer mina bröder is a very psychological novel, it happens that the main story-time stands still while the discourse-time runs on.174 This is of course the consequence of Amor’s frequent cogitation, which takes some time to be described, but is almost instantaneous on the diegetic level. This literary figure is usually referred to as “pause”175 and implies a static story-time but a running discourse time (ST=0, DT≠0) as we have already said. A narrative problem emerges when Amor imagines talking to someone and he reports the dialogue as if it really happened. In the last part of the book, “Tyra”, Amor apparently answers a phone call and chats with his grandmother. Even though the implied reader has already been warned by the implied author that Amor’s words are not always reliable, the conversation appears absolutely real in the beginning. Grandmother and grandson talk for a while without creating any uncertainties in the readers, until the moment when Tyra sounds happy because one of her friends has died. Amor replies to her happiness by saying: “Nej men vad roligt! Så då är ni där allihopa nu?” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 115, “[…] nella narrativa moderna il tempo si è interiorizzato, sciogliendosi dai rigidi binari della cronologia […] Le strutture delle narrazione prendono atto di questa rottura di un cosmo che non c’è più e si volgono alla resa del tempo psicologico, soggettivo, pulviscolare, relativistico” Marchese, L’officina, 130. 174 The story-time is “quello in cui si suppone avvengano le vicende raccontate,” while the discourse-time is “quello in cui la voce narrante ci viene riferendo gli eventi in cui, di norma, ha luogo l’atto dell’ascolto o della lettura” Brioschi, Elementi, 176. 175 “L’autore può […] concentrare la propria attenzione su un singolo episodio […] lasciando in sospeso una situazione narrativa – come in una specie di «fermo immagine» – mediante una pausa (descrittiva o riflessiva) che, inserendosi nell’azione, ne dilata la durata” Bernardelli, Il testo, 87. 173 97 emphasis added) (Wow that’s fun! So are you now there all together?) This där is clearly an allusion to an afterworld, and subsequently other references are made. The dialogue, which was perceived as realistic, rapidly becomes imagined, initially creating confusion as a result of the readers’ expectation that reported dialogues are authentic. A direct dialogue is usually called “scene”, when the story-time and the discourse-time conventionally coincide (ST=DT); 176 indeed the time needed to converse on a diegetic level is perceived to be the same as the one needed to recount the conversation on the discourse level. What is problematic here is that the dialogue is only played in Amor’s mind, and everything that is in one character’s mind implies the time scheme: ST=0, DT≠0, while a conversation implies the scheme: ST=DT. It is clear that story-time and discourse-time cannot be equal and diverge at the same time, therefore the readers feel initially confused when they subconsciously perceive this temporal chaos, but the effect is highly remarkable because it helps again to embody Amor’s imaginative mind. 4.4 THE THEMES OF THE NOVEL – THE RED THREADS Besides the narratological value of the chapter “Tyra”, the conversation between Amor and his grandmother has a highly symbolic meaning in the story. As we have seen, Jag ringer mina bröder portrays Amor’s mind which has been upset by the recent bomb-attack. Within the protagonist’s mind reality and imagination are blended and cannot be told apart, tormenting Amor who cannot distinguish his real “[…] il tempo della storia e il tempo del discorso coincidono nel dialogo: in questo caso parleremo di scena” Brioschi, Elementi, 177. 176 98 enemy (racism) from the enemy he imagines (general persecution). This unbearable fear of being discriminated against is a direct reaction to the others’ fear that a new bomber could blow himself up: while many Swedes are afraid that the terrorist attacks are not over yet, other Swedes expect to be discriminated against and constantly fear being exposed to public disdain. Amor’s anxiety is one “red thread” of the novel and finds resolution in the conversation between the main character and his grandmother. When he asks her if somebody is staring at them, she tenderly answers that people do actually look at them, but it does not matter. 177 After this support, Amor finds the strength to overcome his fear and bear in mind that “Deras blickar kan inte skada oss” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 120) (Their gazes can’t hurt us). While he wanders in the city, Amor also faces an inconsolable sense of loneliness. It is not a coincidence that the novel opens with Amor alone on a dance floor while his friend Shavi is trying in vain to ring him. Not only does the story describe the protagonist’s paranoia, but also his transition from his youth to adulthood. The bröder of the title are Amor’s friends, who have all taken different paths, finding their ways in life. Three chapters are named after these friends, who are in order: Shavi, Ahlmen, and Valeria. Among them, Shavi is actually the most important one since he is constantly present – he continually rings Amor who does not want to answer and therefore the main character is forced to constantly think about him – and plays a fundamental role in the resolution of the story. Shavi is one of Amor’s oldest friends, and is described as a very conscientious father who was previously a bully. The following is Amor’s first assessment of their friendship: 177 “Tittar folk på oss? / Ja det gör dom. Men strunt i dom. Vi behöver inte dom.” Khemiri, Jag ringer, 119. 99 Jag älskar honom som en bror. Korrekt. Han är min bror. Exakt. Nästan på samma sätt som mina bröder är mina bröder. Precis. Vi har varandras ryggar och varje dag vilken dag som helst vi skulle dö för varandra visst? Mm. Eller. Kanske inte dö. För mina bröder skulle jag dö. För mamma skulle jag dö. Men för Shavi? Kom igen nu kompis. Alltså. Vi är uppvuxna i samma kvarter. Vi känner varandra. Han har min rygg och jag har hans. Word. Och vilken dag som helst jag skulle försvara honom, ljuga för honom, ta en kula för honom. Exakt. Så länge kulan inte träffar ansiktet. Vilken dag som helst skulle jag ta en icke-livshotande icke-ansiktsträffande kula för honom. Och jag för dig kompis. Men samtidigt. Jag måste säga. Dom senaste åren. Ända sen han blev pappa så har han varit lite... Vad? Jag vet inte. Vi har glidit ifrån varandra. Han har förändrats. (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 12-14) (I love him like a brother. Correct. He is my brother. Exact. Almost the same way my brothers are my brothers. Right. We cover each other’s backs and every day, any single day we would die for each other right? Mm. Or. Maybe not die. For my brothers I would die. For my mother I would die. But for Shavi? Come on bud. In other words we have grown up in the same neighbourhood. We know each other. I cover his back, he covers mine. Word. And any day I would defend him, lie for him, take a bullet for him. Exact. As long as the bullet doesn’t get me in the face. Any day I would get a non-lethal bullet that doesn’t get me in the face for him. And I for you, friend. But at the same time, I have to say that the last years… Since he became a dad, he has… a little… What? I don’t know. We parted company. He has changed.) 100 The beautiful reported dialogue, that Amor imagines, suggests that his friendship with Shavi used to be stronger than it is now, and Amor feels somehow betrayed, as when one brother departs to start his own family and the other one is left behind alone. Shavi does, however, try to keep in touch with Amor, ringing him repeatedly during the day, and these unanswered calls are used to hint melancholically at their past relationship. Shavi is described as both the aggressive friend who would always defend Amor,178 and as the sensitive person who could cheer Amor up when he was caught cheating on his physics test.179 But since Shavi moved in with his girlfriend and became a father, Amor has felt abandoned and has started to reconsider their friendship. Ahlem and Amor were also close friends (besides being cousins too) and their relationship is told by the narrator in a similarly gloomy and nostalgic tone: […] när Shavi var på dansgolvet gick jag på toa själv och då kunde det bli knas, ibland var det något tönt som skulle läras en läxa, någons keps skulle ryckas och spottas i, någons freestylelurar skulle snos, någons knäskål skulle sparkas ur led av en fly kick och varje gång den personen var jag så tog jag ett steg tillbaka och sa: Ey du vet hon tjejen med krokig näsa som står i dörren? Den är min kusin. Och det var allt som behövde sägas. Här får du tillbaka kepsen, här är dina hörlurar, res dig upp vi skojade ju bara, du fattade att det var ett skämt eller hur? (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 42-43) ([...] when Shavi was on the dance floor, I used to go to the toilet alone and that could be dangerous. Sometimes there was a jerk that had to be taught a lesson, someone’s cap would be pulled away and spitted in, ”Och om ens kusin blev tagen av civilare och först inte fattade att det var civilare utan trodde det var Manals bröder som hon hade lite beef med och därför gjorde motstånd och försökte fly och fick ett käckt näsben så sa Shavi: Din kusin borde ringt mig, jag svär jag hade backat henne, jag hade lagt kombination på kombination, jag hade boxerat grisens näsa tills det bara blod blev kvar.” Khemiri, Jag ringer, 15. 179 ”Och om man till exempel hade fuskat på fysikprovet och läraren såg och rykte ens prov och hotade med IG så kunde man gå ut på gården och där stod Shavi som bara: Vasskadu vara ledsen? So what? Vad spelar en IG för roll? Du kommer komma in på KTH ändå. Jag har IG i fyra ämnen och erkänn det kommer gå bra för mig?” Khemiri, Jag ringer, 14-15. 178 101 someone’s free-style headphones would be taken, somebody’s kneecap would be kicked by a fly kick, and when that somebody was me, I stepped back and said: Hey, do you know that girl with a crooked nose that is standing by the door? She is my cousin. And it was all that had to be said. Here your cap back, here your headphones, stand up, but we were just kidding, you understand it was a joke right?) Amor recalls this missed sense of protection at different times since he feels particularly unsafe in post-attack Stockholm, but also because his friends and relatives have now gone away and he cannot accept it. His rage comes out when he rubs in Ahlem’s face their revolutionary dream, which was abandoned by the young woman for serenity and peace through Oriental philosophy: “Spela inte dum. Vår historia är antingen muslimsk eller kommunistisk. […] Du är precis som vi. Bara att du inte vill erkänna det. Inga patetiska jävla flum-Buddha-citat kan hjälpa dig” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 38) (Don’t be stupid. Our history is either Muslim or communist. […] You’re exactly as we are. You simply don’t want to admit it. No fucking pathetic fuzzy Buddha’s quotes can help you). Finally, Valeria is the girl that Amor fell in love with when they were young, and she represents his teenage-crush who has now found another man. Through a semi-real dialogue – one part is really said at the phone, another is merely imagined – Amor recalls their old days and presents her as an idealized person 180 whose departure meant more than Amor wants to admit. When he sadly realizes that time has passed and they have grown older (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 77), he also understands that the carefree days of his youth have passed as well and he has been left behind by his friends. Valeria asks Amor persistently to stop idealizing her: “Du måste sluta nu för den här personen som du har gjort mig till finns inte, jag finns inte, du har förvandlat mig till en fix idé och jag kommer aldrig kunna matcha fantasin som du har gjort mig till, kan du fatta det?” Khemiri, Jag ringer, 77. 180 102 Shavi, Ahlmen, and Valeria bring to mind Jonas’s friends in Montecore, the ones that had grown up together and shared many political dreams of social equality. Therefore they are also named bröder, as in the previous novel, because they are not simply friends but they have built a relationship which involves protection, sharing, and tender emotions. In the optic of vi och dem (we and them), which is always present in Khemiri’s novels, these marginalized young people tend to feel strongly linked since they are treated racially as a homogenous group and discrimination strengthens their bond. The strong sense of community, however, is broken when Amor’s friends take individual paths; this not only hurts the main character’s feelings, but destroys the family atmosphere that had permeated his youth. A fundamental issue of Jag ringer mina bröder is Amor’s existential crisis and his inconsolable sense of abandonment, and the time setting is used to exaggerate his loneliness and not only to discuss social and racial problems that still remain, however, very important in the novel. This interpretation finds evidence in Amor’s constant need to establish friendly relations with people. In a hardware store where he tries to have a broken drill repaired, he expects to be helped by a dark skinned shop assistant – in Amor’s mind, immigrants and immigrants of second generation should help each other to better survive in the racist Swedish environment: “jag gick fram till honom som kunde varit min bror och jag blinkade mot honom för att han skulle fatta att jag fattade att han fattade att jag fattade” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 89) (I went towards him who could have been my brother and I blinked at him to make him understand that I understood that he understood that I understood). Amor is naïvely sure that a blink would be enough 103 to establish a connection between them. Indeed the man is very nice and helpful, but when Amor uses the word brorsan (a colloquial form of bror, brother), he replies: “Vad kallade du mig?” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 93) (What did you call me?), and Amor’s attempt to establish a friendly connection generates suspicion and coldness. This undermines his illusion of the duality “we against them” which is later discussed again by a conversation with an old school mate whose name is Golberg. Golberg works for an association that fights for animals’ rights, Djurens rätt, and calls people to convince them to become a member. She rings Amor randomly and introduces herself with the Swedish name Karoline, but he perceives that it is not her real name. Under Amor’s pressure to speak the truth, she admits that her name is Golberg and Amor understands that she must use another name at work, pretending to be ethnically Swedish. This issue of names, swedification, was also present in Montecore, when Abbas had to change his name to attract customers. It is indeed likely that a person uses a Scandinavian name in working environments if their name sounds Middle Easterner, and this is once again due to Swedish racial prejudice. Once more Amor is exposed to how racist Sweden can be and he gets mad at her 181 because she accepts compromises (but what else could she do?) and somehow nullifies Amor’s dream of a fairer society. Not only is Amor lonely because he feels betrayed by his friends who have abandoned their war against racism, but also because he cannot find new allies, new bröder. Throughout the story Amor lacks familiar figures and affection and his “Jag svär – alla ni fega som tror ni kan smälta in utan att bekänna färg, er domedag kommer, vänta bara. Jag kommer knulla er, hör du det? Jag kommer behandla er värre än djur. Jag kommer skjuta er som hundar, jag kommer flå er som katter, jag kommer klubba er som sälar, jag kommer, jag kommer, jag kommer stompa er som kackerlackor och raka er som minkar och...” Khemiri, Jag ringer, 99. 181 104 peregrination is not just real, but also psychological and will lead him to find the strength to fight his inner ghosts and his deep sense of loneliness. 4.4.1 The family issue Swedish familism has always attracted scholars and sociologists because of its nonconformity. Already in 1987, David Popenoe of Rutgers University portrayed the Swedish family as the most different from the ideal-typical nuclear form in industrial societies. Many years have passed, and it is important to refresh what an ideal family meant at that time. Popenoe defined it as a “[…] monogamous, patriarchal family consisting of a married couple living with their children, the man working outside the home and the woman being a mother and full-time housewife.”182 In spite of the fact that this definition may now sound outdated, this article shows how Sweden began to challenge the traditional family from quite early on. At that time the marriage rate in Sweden was the lowest in the Western world, while non-marital cohabitation and family dissolution had the highest rates. 183 At the same time, Popenoe pointed out that Swedes, like other Western peoples, wanted to build a family, but did not want others to tell them how to do it. It can therefore be surmised that the familiar institution was not questioned, but the ideal type of nuclear family was debated. 184 Since then much attention has been paid to this topic and family relationships have David Popenoe, “Beyond the Nuclear Family: A Statistical Portrait of the Changing Family in Sweden”, Journal of Marriage and Family 49 (1987): 174. 183 Popenoe, “Changing family in Sweden”, 174. 184 “There are other indications, however, that suggest that the Swedish family, at least in some form, is ’here to stay.’ Almost all Swedish men and women seem still to want to live as a couple sometime in their lives; they have not turned against the idea of permanent, monogamous dyads, despite the instability of these dyads in practice. There appear to be few men or women in Sweden who are single by choice or whose singleminded pursuit of a career tends to rule out a family.” Popenoe, “Changing family in Sweden”, 181. 182 105 changed immensely in every industrial society, but what Swedes have been showing for several decades is a radical ability to continuously question and challenge the stereotypical patriarchal family. They have indeed revealed a unique capacity to reinvent familiar boundaries without erasing many positive values that family involves. This particular approach to what family means has influenced Swedish literature since the nineteenth century. For instance, Giftas I (Getting Married I ) by August Strindberg represents a colourful description of how traditional family was already brought into question in 1884.185 He wanted to depict the many varieties of marriage, and in 1886 he published another, more polemical and violent volume with other short stories which had the same aim, Giftas II (Getting Married II). Due to Strindberg’s irony and his ambiguous ideas on women his stories are often difficult to understand, but his desire to portray the early inter-family changes of his time is evident. This topic was fashionable in nineteenth century Sweden and has not stopped interesting writers since then. However it does not have the same shocking impact, and many new kinds of families (as single parents, LGBTQ parenting, etc.) are more or less accepted by society nowadays. This assumed heterogeneous idea of “new family” is often described in contemporary Swedish literature (very often in children’s literature), but it is sometimes taken for granted and it has ceased to be a core topic. This is the case of Jag ringer mina bröder, in which the author has scattered many hints about an unconventional idea of family across the book. Khemiri has probably not described Amor’s idea of family on purpose, but it is interesting to analyse what he has written about it incidentally. The core of the novel 185 August Strindberg, Giftas I-II (Stockholm: Norstedts, 1982). Also online at: http://litteraturbanken.se/#!/forfattare/StrindbergA/titlar/Giftas/sida/3/etex. 106 may be how the bomb attack of December 2010 has influenced the Middle East looking protagonist, and Amor’s story may not primarily focus on his family history, but I argue that it does deal with it in the background. And we may say that this is not very marginal since the title itself includes the word brothers. During the story, Amor just alludes to his twin brothers and his parents, while his grandmother plays a main role in the last chapter, as we have seen, as a memory that comforts and supports the lonely young man. He lives alone, and his home represents a safe zone but seems to lack human warmth; compared to this the outside world is rough and violent, it is where people judge and look at him with anger. The home only partially satisfies Amor’s need for protection, and he longs for a place where he can feel comfort, understanding, and joy. He does long to feel at home, which means to feel that he belongs to something and/or somebody. His longing is overemphasized by his identity crisis and by a society that opposes him. Amor is like a chrysalis in transaction, he needs calm and protection to take the thorny step that will change the perception he has of himself. The novel seems to develop according to Claudio Magris’s stance on the lack of family in contemporary literature.186 Magris claims that family has always been used by literature to depict a place where its members are able to find true human relationships, and protection. He also points out how the family from which one comes from has attracted more interest than the family that one may establish, since our roots employ invincible forces on us. 187 If literature has the task to describe Claudio Magris, “Il romanzo senza famiglia?”, Corriere della Sera, April 26, 2000, and in: Alfabeti (Milano: Garzanti, 2008), 33-38. 187 “L’ethos della stirpe prevale su ogni scelta personale, stringe con la necessità della natura; l’amore può venire e passare, il matrimonio si può sciogliere, ma essere fratelli è un dato di fatto, epico e oggettivo, come il colore dei capelli. La letteratura è stata molto più capace di raccontare questa saga dei padri, della famiglia 186 107 reality, nowadays it must tell the disaggregation of the nuclear family, which implies a loss of its values. Furthermore, the disintegration of family erases a sense of belonging and protection that can only be found in the hearth. Jag ringer mina bröder seems to follow this idea: Amor reveals feelings of vulnerability and disorientation. In addition, his friends have apparently abandoned him to wandering in a malevolent city and falling prey to his fervent imagination. Amor has to admit his sadness, and only then does he find the strength to react and to seek the protection he needs. However, Amor finally calls Shavi and asks him to meet in the city. Shavi doesn’t need any explanations and the novel ends with his promise to be there soon. The need for consolation and protection which Magris connects solely to the hearth, is represented by friendship in Jag ringer mina bröder. Family may betray us (as Amor’s father seems to have), while friends are with us to stay and only they can understand what we need and when we need it. “Jag skulle behöva… Jag vet inte. Och Shavi förstod.” (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 124) (I should need… I don’t know. And Shavi understood.) Amor’s words reveal a tender affection between the two friends. Between friends comprehension is immediate and affinity strong, therefore friendship can fulfil the important needs a broken family cannot satisfy. Magris is right when he writes that we need to defend a certain role of family which “significa la possibilità di sentirsi a casa nella vita e nel mondo.” 188 (means the possibility to feel at home in life and in the world), but he is wrong when he considers only the nuclear family may engender this feeling. Khemiri wants to show that authentic family values are not in danger because of the crisis of traditional family, but rather d’origine, che non l’odissea – ardua e imprevedibile, affascinante e rischiosa – della famiglia che si fonda, dell’esistenza condivisa nell’amore coniugale, dei figli.” Magris, “Il romanzo”. 188 Magris, “Il romanzo”. 108 they have been transferred to new alternative relationships. Friends (kompisar, vänner) become brothers (bröder) because they satisfy those needs that we habitually consider family prerogatives. 4.5 THE BOOK REVIEWS AND THE POLITICAL LENS Swedish critics were very pleased by Jag ringer mina bröder, and reviews189 were genuinely positive. 190 All the reviewers focused on the novel’s poetic and special style, which is said to be very fitting for the representation of Amor’s thoughts.191 They have all understood Khemiri’s desire to represent the struggle that is within the main character and his complex relationship with a society which he belongs to, but which also discriminates against him. 192 In the interview with Carin Stålberg, published on Dagens Nyheter, Khemiri stresses his wish to represent a young man whose self-perception is shaped by what people think of him – or, better, by what he 189 The reviews that have been taken into consideration are the following: Bromander, “Hög puls bevarar omedelbarheten”; Ravini, ”Jonas Hassen Khemiri / Jag ringer mina bröder”; Koldenius, ”Recension: Jag ringer mina bröder av Jonas Hasen Khemiri”; Nykvist, ”Mörkrets alla nyanser”; Eriksson, ”Platt text om bombdådet i Stockholm”; Wahlin, ”Om utanförskap inifrån”; Karlsson, ”Jag ringer mina bröder, Jonas Hassen Khemiri”. I have also taken into consideration the following interview: Stålberg, “Jag skriver för att hitta nyanserna”. 190 Koldenius, “Recension”. 191 Lennart, “Hög plus”; Eriksson, “Platt text”. 192 Khemiri openly expressed his interest in blowing up the perception of a dual-divided society, where one could only feel belonging either to the victims or to the criminals: “På många hall innebar bombattentatet en ökad polarisering. Alltså folk tog tydlig ställning. Min text gör ju inte det. Den är snarare ett försök att förstå nyanser.” Stålberg, ”Jag skriver”. 109 presumes they think about him.193 His craving for a trusted identity was emphasized by all the critics, who ignored, however, the secondary characters – Amor’s relatives and friends were in unison considered as mere interlocutors and they were presumed to have no importance in the novel’s development. Amor became the symbol for “alla muslimer, inklusive alla ‘som ser ut som muslimer’ i Sverige” 194 (all the Muslims, as well as ‘all the ones that look Muslim’ in Sweden) and the novel was endowed with such a political meaning that Annika Koldenius wrote on Borås Tidning that “Jonas Hassen Khemiri är en politisk författare med en agenda, en författare som undersöker perspektiv och sanningar” 195 (Jonas Hassen Khemiri is a political writer with an agenda, a writer that examines prospective and truths). Khemiri too affirmed that his ambition is “att visa hur bedräglig en enkel sanning är. Det är naturligtvis lockande att läsa en författare som gör anspråk på att berätta sanningen, men jag älskar osäkerheten”196 (to show that one single truth is deceiving. It is obviously tempting to read a writer who claims to say the truth, but I love the uncertainty). It cannot be denied that a political issue is present in the novel and Amor’s desire to find self-definition is indeed a very important theme. Jag ringer mina bröder deals with Amor’s anxiety to shape himself and to find a place that he can call his own. Throughout the whole time of the story, the main character seeks stability, comprehension, and freedom to express himself, which have been destroyed by the recent explosion and his friends’ departures. Even if the city has recovered “Amor är en man som vars självbild är beroende av andra tär beroende av andra tänker och tycker på honom. Eller rättare sagt, vad han tror att de tänker om honom.” Stålberg, “Jag skriver”. 194 Bromander, “Hög plus”. 195 Koldenius, “Recension”. 196 Stålberg, “Jag skriver”. 193 110 fast, an extensive police presence on the streets shows that the situation is still uncertain and paradoxically Amor feels more unsafe than safer. Amor’s fear finds its roots in the perception that the police are not there to defend people, but are rather a tool used by politicians to exert control over people. Khemiri said that he, while writing the novel, remembered a series of abuses of power that his friend and he had been victims of in the past.197 In Jag ringer mina bröder, the police shows their fascist face proving that certain Swedes are treated differently. One cannot forget, however, that what takes place in the novel happens in Amor’s mind, and the police’s perversion corresponds to Amor’s perception of it and not to reality. However this perception is based on real facts: in recent years, the Swedish police have been indirectly authorized to discriminate against dark-skinned people through orders to check if they are in possession of a regular residence permit198 and to fight illegal immigration. These checks are regulated by the so called REVA project, which became active at the beginning of 2012. 199 Khemiri wrote an article 200 on this topic in Dagens Nyheter in March 2013, which explains the difficulties that some Swedes of foreign origins have to face. Khemiri based his analysis on his personal experience explaining how he has often ”När jag skrev boken så mindes jag en massa vardagliga händelser från min uppväxt. Piketpoliser som stoppade mig och mina vänner och frågade om leg, helt utan anledning, gång på gång. Dörrvakter som nekade oss på krogar. Butiksvakter som förföljade oss i klädaffärer. Det var helt normalt.” Stålberg, ”Jag ringer”. 198 In Swedish: uppehållstillstånd. 199 The REVA Projekt, which stands for Rättssäkert och Effektivt Verkställighetsarbete (Legal Certainty and Effective Enforcement), is a Swedish operation carried out by Police, Kriminalvården (Swedish Prison and Probation Service), and Migrationsverket (Swedish Migration Board). The project is co-funded by the European Return Fund and is active between 1st, January, 2012 and 30th, June, 2014. During this time police officers are allowed to check people’s residence permits to prevent illegal migration. In Stockholm, these checks have been carried out along with underground-ticket inspections. REVA has led to a wide debate since it appears to be based on people’s appearance and skin colour, but Police claim that the project is carried out within reason. However it is difficult to trust that the checks are not directly or indirectly related to people’s name, language, and origin, a form of “racial profiling”, as Khemiri claims in his article. 200 Khemiri, “Bästa”. 197 111 been discriminated against because of his appearence. The article, which is an open letter to Beatrice Ask, the current Swedish Mister of Justice, goes hand in hand with Jag ringer mina bröder: while the novel fictionalizes events and feelings, the article reveals how people are actually being treated by society, police, and politicians. In his last novel and in his widely debated article, Khemiri discusses the same topic, presented from a similar perspective: he focuses on what it feels like to be treated unequally in your own country. However we cannot overlap Amor with Khemiri, since the first one tells his story as a fictional character paying much attention to the psychological consequences, while Khemiri pays much more attention to the social, political, and economical implications in “Bästa Beatrice Ask”. The author wants to provoke different reactions in his readers: Amor seeks sympathy, while Khemiri seeks reasoning. The article “Bästa Beatrice Ask” is first and foremost a reaction to Ask’s racist statements on the radio program “P1 Morgon”, while simultaneously answering a few questions about the REVA project: Därför blev jag förvånad när du i torsdags fick frågan av ”P1 Morgon” om du som justitieminister känner dig oroad över att personer (medborgare, skattebetalare, röstare) hävdar att de har blivit stoppade av polisen och frågade på pass enbart på grund av sitt (mörka, icke-blonda, svarthåriga) utseende. Och du svarade: - Upplevelsen av varför någon har frågat mig kan ju vara väldigt personlig. Det finns tidigare dömda som uppfattar att de alltid är ifrågasatta, fast det syns ju inte på någon att man har begått ett brott. (...) För att göra en bedömming av om polisen arbetar enligt lagar och regler så måste man ha helhetsperspektivet. (Khemiri, “Bästa”) (“So I was surprised last Thursday when the radio program P1 Morgon asked you whether, as the Minister of Justice, you are concerned that people (citizens, taxpayers, voters) claim they have been stopped by the police and asked for ID solely because of their (dark, not-blond, blackhaired) appearances. And you answered: 112 “One’s experience of ‘why someone has questioned me’ can of course be very personal. There are some who have been previously convicted and feel that they have always been questioned, even though you can’t tell by looking at a person that they have committed a crime […] in order to judge whether the police are acting in accordance with laws and rules, one has to look at the big picture.” Willson-Broyles, “Open Letter”) The article subsequently becomes a list of real incidents when Khemiri was the victim of discrimination, thus proving to the minister that discrimination is not simply a matter of subjective perception. Some of them had already been published in previous articles or interviews, such as the time when Khemiri got stopped by the police because he simply looked like someone else and he matched the description.201 Referring to this event, Khemiri adds that he felt powerless and guilty because he had no chance to prove his innocence: I tjugo minuter satt vi där i polisbilen. Ensamma. Fast ändå inte ensamma. För hundratals människor passerade. Och de tittade in på oss med en blick som viskade: ”Där. En till. иnnu en som beter sig helt i enlighet med våra fördomar.” Och jag önskar att du hade varit med mig i polispiketen, Beatrice Ask. Men du var inte det. Jag satt där ensam. Och jag mötte alla förbipasserande blickar och försökte signalera att jag inte var skyldig, att jag bara hade stått på en plats och sett ut på ett visst sätt. Men det är svårt att argumentera för sin oskuld i baksätet av en polisbuss. (Khemiri, ”Bästa”) (“We sat in the police van for twenty minutes. Alone. But not really alone. Because a hundred people were walking by. And they looked in at us with a look that whispered, "There. One more. Yet another one who is acting in complete accordance with our prejudices." And I wish you had been with me in the police van, Beatrice Ask. But you weren't. I sat there alone. And I met all the eyes walking by and tried to show them that I wasn't guilty, that I had just been standing in a place and looking a particular way. But it's hard to argue your innocence in the back seat of a police van.” Willson-Broyles, “Open Letter”) 201 The fact is reported in Stålberg, “Jag skriver”. 113 On that occasion Khemiri realized how powerful people’s stares are, and he admitted that he had based Amor’s fear on this awareness202 – so it can be said that the social issue the novel relates to is the shared racist perception that condemns some Swedes as guilty by implicit racial bias. This in turn becomes a political issue when the law allows the police to check somebody’s documents, on the bias of their name, appearance, and skin colour, while ignoring others, because they are ethnically Swedish. The problem is then both social and political since “Alla bara gjorde sina jobb. Vacktarna, poliserna, tullstjänstemännen, politikerna, folket” (Khemiri, ”Bästa”) (”Everyone was just doing their job. The security guards, the police, the customs officials, the politicians, the people.” Willson-Broyles, “Open Letter”). A reference to Hannah Arendt’s Banality of Evil becomes very clear: evil (and so racism) originates from ordinary people’s tendency to conform and obey without critically evaluating the consequences of their actions, and the law cannot be trusted to always be just and right.203 This complex situation makes it very hard for Amor to define himself, and while the main character of the previous novels had rejected everything that was Scandinavian a priori, Amor actually feels he belongs more to Swedish society. He tries to combine his minority culture with the dominant one, showing an integration attitude, which is the most adaptive according to psychologists John Berry and Charles Westin. 204 In his essay “Young People of Migrant Origin in Sweden,” Westin argues that individuals with foreign origins have to deal with both their ”Han [Amor] finns bara i andras blickar [...] Hans blick på sig själv är aldrig nog. Det är ett drag vi delar, han och jag. [...] De där blickarna... de är så fruktansvärt kratfulla.” Stålberg, “Jag skriver”. 203 Hanna Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem (London: Penguin Classics, 2006). 204 J. Berry, “Immigration, Acculturation and Adaptation”, Applied Psychology: An International Review 46 (1997): 5-68; and Charles Westin, “Young People of Migrant Origin in Sweden”, International Migration Review 37 (2003): 987-1010. 202 114 minority culture and the shared majority culture. They might recreate “four acculturation strategies: assimilation (rejecting ethnic minority culture in favor of the majority culture), integration (combining both cultures), separation (relying on ethnic minority culture only and rejecting majority culture) and marginalization (rejecting both cultures).”205 In light of this analysis, by living in a society which is at least partly inclusive Amor should have adopted a winning strategy. However, Khemiri reminds us that “det är omöjligt att vara en del av gemenskapen när Makten ständigt förutsätter att en är en Annan” (Khemiri, Bästa) (“And it's impossible to be part of a community when Power continually assumes that you are an Other” WillsonBroyles, “Open Letter”). Since Sweden discriminates against some of its people, these people will never be free to feel part of the community and will always be torn between their expectations to be absorbed by society and the fact that they are treated differently. This perception of exclusion finds evidence in the text when Amor names himself Unutrium (Khemiri, Jag ringer, 18). The chemical element which he chooses to associate himself with is highly symbolic - Unutrium is a chemical element synthesized in 2003, whose standard state and colour are still unknown. Furthermore its properties have been predicted but not studied yet. 206 This means that Amor considers himself an unnatural individual, whose features are unknown and who does not fit in any pre-existent social group: his skin is too dark to be Swedish, but he was born and raised in Sweden. As we have seen, the political issue is very important to Khemiri and critics have emphasized this aspect. One cannot deny that Jag ringer mina bröder deals with 205 206 Westin, “Young People”, 1006. “Ununtrium”, accessed October 5, 2013, http://www.webelements.com/ununtrium/. 115 social and racial discrimination – which is overstated by Amor’s paranoia – but it is doubtful that a political reading is comprehensive of the different levels of meaning of the novel. The critics’ obsession with the political issue is on the contrary the result of a metaphorical lens, through which they read Khemiri’s novels, that enables them to freely debate his work. Invandrarförfattarna are by definition expected to be politically committed and their novels’ political implications are particularly important to the critics, because they confirm their right to categorise writers’ work as invandrarlitteratur. We may call this harmless prejudice a “political lens”, because it overstates the social criticism that is within the text and minimizes the other topics. Therefore as long as critics consider Khemiri as an invandrarförfattare their reading will be partial and incomplete since their expectations will prevent them from making a more comprehensive analysis. *** It can undoubtedly be said that Jag ringer mina bröder is primarily the narration of Amor’s existential troubles. His relationships with friends and relatives are the central core of the novel while the Stockholm bombings represent the time and place settings. The settings, of course, influence the narration and Amor’s individual crisis is loaded with wider political and social problems. Amor’s story evolves on different levels: on a personal level he has to face the loneliness that his friends and relatives’ departure has caused, and on a social level he has to bear his racist environment which also leads to isolation. These diverse despondent feelings are finally overcome thanks to his friend Shavi who proves his loyalty to Amor, and to Tyra’s forgotten 116 teaching that reemerges in the protagonist’s mind. There is also a third problem that Amor has to face within the novel, his difficulty in telling imagination and reality apart. His fervent mind ferments his fears, but the final reconciliation with Shavi suggests a rapprochement with real relationships and actual life. In conclusion, Jag ringer mina bröder has unfortunately been stereotyped by critics, who have tended to view Amor’s paranoia as a mere consequence of his social exclusion. Despite the fact that reviews have been very enthusiastic, they have shown a refusal to go beyond the political criticism of the writer, leveling out the multi-layer structure of the novel. 117 CHAPTER V – Khemiri the Playwright Invasion!, Fem gånger gud, and Apatiska för nybörjare In the introduction to the anthology Teatro svedese contemporaneo, Claudio Petrangeli claims that the Swedes love theatre as much as the Italians love football. 207 This humorous exaggeration aims to illustrate to what degree cultural policies in Sweden have contributed to increasing the possibility for every citizen to have access to theatrical culture in the last decades. Public support is given to all art forms, but theatre is the most highly subsidized (almost 30% of public funds).208 For this reason, contemporary Swedish theatre is particularly prosperous and attracts many young writers who can prove to be good playwrights. This was the case with Jonas Hassen Khemiri, who has written Invasion!209, Fem gånger gud210 (Five times god), Vi som är hundra (We who are one hundred), and Apatiska för nybörjare211 (Apathy212 for beginners). 213 Khemiri turned out to be very 207 Claudio Petrangeli, editor, Teatro svedese contemporaneo, (Roma: Gremese Editore, 2004), 7. Petrangeli, Teatro svedese, 7, and Margareta Wirmark, “Sweden”, in European Theatre, Cross-cultural perspectives, ed. Ralph Yarrow (London: Routledge,1992), 165. 209 Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Invasion!, in Invasion. Pjäser, noveller, texter (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2009), 73145. 210 Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, Invasion. Pjäser, noveller, texter (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2009), 171-248. 211 I have read and used a private copy of the play that Jonas Hassen Khemiri has kindly sent me. The text of Apatiska has been printed out as a play booklet by some theatres but it is hard, if not impossible, to find. Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Apatiska för nybörjare (Norsborg: Riksteatern, 2010); Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Apatiska för nybörjare (Göteborg: Folkteatern, 2011); Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Apatiska för nybörjare (Stockholm: Stockholms stadsteater, 2013). 212 The word Apatiska in Swedish is a neologism. It is constructed by adding the suffix –ska, which indicates that the linguistic unit refers to a language, to the word apati (apathy). For instance the word Italien (Italy) 208 118 talented at and perfectly suited to theatrical work – Invasion! played two sold out seasons at the Stockholm City Theatre and has been performed in Norway, France, Germany, United Kingdom and United States. With his plays, Khemiri continues to explore the power of words, the problems involved in defining our individuality, and how our physical appearance and names bear strong connotations. In addition, his work is imbued with a strong but subtle criticism of Swedish society’s false openness and Nordic social exclusion. Moreover, Khemiri’s theatre is determined by high-quality metatheatrical techniques which are used to deconstruct the theatrical illusion and to expose its deceitfulness. This is a method which finds its roots in Western contemporary theatre tradition, most especially in Bertolt Brecht’s theatre, which aims to rouse the spectators’ awareness about the social problems the plays deal with. Although my thesis has till now focused on the family issue and on the problematic human relationships in the novels – paying attention on the reception of the critics at the same time – this chapter will deal with a slightly different topic. Since Khemiri’s theatre tells the stories of many characters simultaneously – while his novels rather focus on the story of one single main character – the familiar topic is less debated. However the plays that I will analyse deal with other themes which were very present in all the novels. This is the case of language as an expression of can get the suffix –ska, therefore becoming italienska, which means “Italian (language)”. Khemiri plays here with the fact that many language courses for beginners are called indeed “[språk] för nybörjare” ([language] for beginners), for instance “Italienska för nybörjare” (Italian for beginners). As we shall see, this play is about the real story of some young immigrants who were actually sick, but the media and the Swedish politicians thought they were just pretending to be sick to get a residence permit for their families. Apatiska för nybörjare is thus a play that ironically suggests that the language of the apathetic children can be thought to those who want to become apathetic and try to get a residence permit in Sweden. 213 In 2013 a dramatized version of the novel Jag ringer mina bröderwas staged. It will not be taken into consideration here, since the novel has already been analysed in the previous chapter. Vi som är hundra will not be considered either, because it was not available neither in libraries nor on internet. So to say that this chapter will only focus on the plays Invasion!, Fem gånger gud, and Apatiska för nybörjare. 119 individuality, the necessity to define one’s identity, and most of all the life of young Swedes with multiethnic backgrounds. I will also take into consideration the reception of the critics, pointing out when their reviews have been influenced by their misconception of Khemiri as only an invandrarförfattare. Indeed, critics were all more interested in the plays’ political element, failing to mention Khemiri’s style which is not only distinctive but represents an important key to understanding his theatre. 5.1 RECEPTION OF THE CRITICS Theatre reviews on Khemiri’s works have been very enthusiastic. When Invasion! debuted at the Stockholm City Theatre under the direction of Farnaz Arabi, Sara Granath wrote in the Svenska Dagbladet that “Jonas Hassen Khemiri visar med sin intelligent uppbyggda text att han inte bara är författare […], han är dramatiker också”214 (Jonas Hassen Khemiri proves with his intelligently constructed play that not only is he a writer […], but also a playwright), pointing out that language is fundamental and “visar på den poetiska potentialen i bruten svenska” (shows the poetic potential of broken Swedish). The same positive feedback came from the pages of the newspaper Aftonbladet, where Jan Arnald asserted that the real protagonist of the play was the name “Abulkasem”, 215 thus implying the Sarah Granath, ”Känslostark utmaning av teatern”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Svenska Dagbladet, March 11, 2006, accessed September 18, 2013, http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/kanslostark-utmaning-av-teatern_298418.svd. 215 “Huvudpersonen i Jonas Hassen Khemiris debutpjäs på Stockholms stadsteater är ett ord. Det är inte ordet "invasion", titeln som snarare beskriver vad pjäsen utför. Nej, huvudperson är ordet "Abulkasem". Just 214 120 predominance of language over the other theatrical features. Khemiri was indubitably applauded as a great playwright and positive feedback came from all the countries where Invasion! was performed. The play was enthusiastically welcomed by critics in the USA as well and the reviews focused mainly on the manipulative power of language that Invasion! represented.216 However, a review by Hedy Weiss published in the Chicago Sun-Times on 6th August, 2011 was quite negative and contained comments on racial profiling.217 Since Weiss argued that Khemiri did not think about any practical alternative to the difficult topic of migration, the article opened a debate in the USA about the political implications within the play. The same kind of reception was received by Fem gånger gud: the critics were enthusiastic but, again, only wrote about the fact that the play dealt with “våld, rasism och Sveriges nazifläckiga förflutna” 218 (violence, racism, and Sweden’s Nazistained past) and of course with “språkets makt”219 (the power of language). Sara Granath even admitted that ”Det kan ju vara tröttsamt att ofta höra talas om rasism. Men det kan inte jämföras med att ofta utsättas för den” 220 (It can indeed be tiring to be always told about racism, but it cannot be compared with being often exposed to ordet.” Jan Arnald, “Subversivt”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Aftonbladet, March 11, 2006, accessed September 17, 2013, http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/article10778290.ab. 216 Jason Zinoman, “A Slip of the Tongue Could Lead to Terror”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, New York Times, February 23, 2011, accessed September 17, 2013, http://theater.nytimes.com/2011/02/23/theater/reviews/23invasion.html?_r=1&; Eric Grode, “Subversive Tongue and a Sharp Focus on Identity Politics”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, New York Times, September 11, 2011, accessed September 18, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/theater/jonas-hassen-khemiri-the-playwright-behind-invasion.html. 217 Hedy Weiss, “’Invasion!’ arrives at divisive time in the world”, review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Chicago Sun-Times, August 6, 2011, accessed September 19, 2013, http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/stage/21687599-421/invasion-arrives-at-worlds-divisive-time.html. 218 Sara Granath, “Inbilska elever speglar oss”, review of Fem gånger gud, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Svenska Dagbladet, October 5, 2008, accessed September 19, 2013, http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/inbilska-elever-speglar-oss_1833621.svd. 219 Granath, “Inbilska elever”. 220 Granath, “Inbilska elever”. 121 it). From Aftonbladet, Khemiri received a very clear endorsement for his second play and was presented as Sweden’s most loved playwright. 221 The fact that Khemiri has always been very dear to Swedish theatre critics does not necessarily mean that his works were also fully understood, and when Apatiska för nybörjare had its second debut in February 2013, Lars Ring could only find the words “politisk teater”222 (political theatre) to describe this beautiful play. Of course critics did not forget to mention Khemiri’s debt towards Gellert Tamas, 223 but they did not change their perception of the play, which had already been said, after its first premier in September 2011, to be “en pjäs om civilkurage, om nödvändigheten att åtminstone ibland lyssna till den inre röst som uppmanar till handling även när det känns jobbigt och obekvämt”224 (a play about civil courage, about the need to listen, at least sometimes, to the inner voice that calls us to action, even when it feels awkward and uncomfortable). It is undeniable that the critics are right in highlighting both the importance of language – especially in Invasion! – and the political implications in Khemiri’s theatre work but, on the other hand, what is perplexing is the reason why they only “På bara några få år har Jonas Hassen Khemiri blivit hela teater-Sveriges favoritdramatiker” Jenny Aschenbrenner, ”Underhållning i dess mest intelligenta form”, review of Fem gånger gud, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Aftonbladet, October 17, 2008, accessed September 19, 2013, http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/teater/article11539900.ab. 222 Lars Ring, “Hela ensemblen lyser i viktig politisk pjäs”, review of Apatiska för nybörjare, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Svenska Dagbladet, Feburary 17, 2013, accessed September 19, 2013, http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/hela-ensemblen-lyser-i-viktig-politisk-pjas_7921872.svd. 223 Gellert Tamas is a Swedish-Hungarian journalist and writer who wrote a book called De apatiska. Om makt, myter och manipulation (Stockholm: Natur och Kultur, 2009). His book narrates the true story of some young immigrant people, who were apparently apathetic and did not react to any stimulation. The parliament had to vote on whether these kids were actually sick or if they had had been drugged by their parents to get a resident permit, as someone claimed. The apathetic children were then sent back with their family and their cases were considered a deceit. Tamas recalled attention on this case, claiming that the Minister of Migration lied at the time and that the children were really sick. 224 Mikael Löfgren, “’Apatiska för nybörjare’ på Folkteatern”, review of Apatiska för nybörjare, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Dagens Nyheter, September 19, 2011, accessed September 19, 2013, http://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/scenrecensioner/apatiska-for-nyborjare-pa-folkteatern/. 221 122 focused on these characteristics while avoiding any analysis of the metatheatrical structure of the plays, which is essential to understanding Khemiri’s idea of theatre. One answer could be that daily newspaper readers do not have any interest in speculation about critical elements. However, critics should understand when these elements are fundamental and should at least explain their importance.225 It can, however, be helpful to have a brief look at the linguistic and political issues that have been stressed by the critics, prior to concluding with a wider view on the complexity of Khemiri’s theatrical structure, focusing on the reason why his theatrical disillusion has important consequences on the meaning of his works. 5.2 LANGUAGE IN INVASION! The linguistic complexity of Invasion! is the consequence of its complex structure of sixteen different roles played by only four actors. Every character has to speak in a number of distinctive ways in order to be distinguishable from the other characters which the same actor plays, and diverse accents and idiolects render every part recognizable. With a view to understanding the idea of this complexity, one has only to consider, for instance, that actor A has to perform the role of a theatre actor, a gay Lebanese dancer, a guide, a journalist, and an Iranian apple-picker. While the actors have to prove their chameleonic skills, Khemiri has demonstrated once again his interest in socio-linguistic diversity. To be honest, something about the mise en abyme structure that labels Khemiri’s plays was mentioned in one of the previously quoted reviews – “there are plays within the play” Zinoman, “A Slip of the Tongue”. 225 123 In the first scene, two young men who act and talk as suburban teenagers, discuss how they turned a name into an all-purpose slang when they were at high school. Their language is used as a social bonding, as Halimiska in Ett öga rött, and they reveal to the audience how random words can become part of their idiolect. After watching the romantic play Signora Luna by Carl Jonas Love Almqvist, they agreed that it was terrible, but one of them admits that he liked the name Abulkasem.226 From that moment on, Abulkasem comes to mean anything: Och senare på terminen […] kunde Abulkasem betyda precis vad som helst. Det kunde vara adjectiv… […] Verb… […] förolämpning… […] komplimang… […] Det blev det perfekta ordet. Men ibland blev det förstås missförstånd... […] Men oftast fattade man av sammanhanget. (Khemiri, Invasion!, 85-86) (“And later on that same term […] Abulkasem came to mean anything at all. It could be an adjective… […] A verb… […] an insult… […] a compliment… […] It became the perfect word… Now and then of course there would be misunderstanding… […] Only usually you’d get it from the context.” Perry, Invasion!, 145)227 By playing with language, Khemiri reveals once again how words are submissive and how one can use them according to one’s will. Abulkasem becomes a red thread that snakes through society with a series of coincidences. It is firstly used by a young man who does not like his name (Arvind), subsequently introducing himself as Abulkasem to a graduate student (Lara) he hits on. She then calls a famous Muslim film director, whose real name is Aouatef, Abulkasem. At the same time Arvind tries to call Lara, who has given him the wrong telephone number, and leaves some voice Abulkasem is the name of a pirate captain in Almqvist’s play. In Signora Luna, Donna Antonia falls in love with this Arab corsair but finds opposition in his aristocratic Italian father. The play was written in 1835 and is set in Palermo during the Middle Ages. 227 English translation of the play is by Frank Perry. Frank Perry, trans., Invasion!, in 6x Contemporary Swedish Plays (Stockholm: Svensk teaterunion ITI, 2006), 133-193. 226 124 messages on an illegal-immigrant apple picker’s answering machine. Finally, the refugee uses the name Abulkasem when the police detain him and in the last scene, a character who plays Khemiri’s younger brother explains how he came up with the idea for the play – while watching the news on TV, he sees the photo of an asylumseeking apple picker who insisted that his name was Abulkasem. The young brother realizes that he had already seen the man in very terrible circumstances. Many diverse social classes are depicted, and they are realistically represented on stage through the use of appropriate linguistic style. 228 The young students speak blattesvenska, while the experts (who present their findings about a “real” terrorist Abulkasem in three interludes), Lara and her friends speak standard Swedish. The apple picker can barely express himself in Swedish and needs a translator. Moreover, the young brother makes grammatical mistakes here and there since Swedish is not his mother tongue, but in this linguistic chaos, the scenes are linked by the symbolic name Abulkasem which is given a wider and wider meaning. The problem of translation is also presented in scene number five, when the Iranian apple picker’s words are translated on scene. Khemiri uses this stage direction to describe the consequent dialogue: “TOLKEN kommer in på scenen. I kommande parti är alla ÄPPELPLOCKARENS repliker på ett främmande språk (arabiska/persiska) och tolkas till svenska av TOLKEN” (Khemiri, Invasion!, 114) (”C comes on stage. ALL of A’s lines are said in PERSIAN (apart from the song texts in English, of course) and interpreted into English by C” Perry, Invasion!, 176). As one may imagine, the audience has mostly no knowledge of Arabic or Persian and 228 Khemiri might have found inspiration in the American playwright David Mamet. He is very interested in linguistic playfulness and his characters are definable by their language. Massimiliano Caprara notices that: “La più grande arte di Mamet è quindi quella di creare i personaggi a partire dal loro linguaggio; essi sono quello che dicono […]” Massimiliano Caprara, Il teatro contemporaneo (Roma: Ediesse, 2013), 108. 125 they consequently trust the translation to be reliable. Reading the script makes one aware that the translation is, not only inaccurate but, rather deceiving on purpose – a stage direction indicates after several line of correct translation that “TOLKEN börjar nu modifier hans historia” (Khemiri, Invasion!, 117) (“C now starts making alterations to A’s story” Perry, Invasion!, 179). The two stories differ a lot, and while the apple picker recounts his love for music, the interpreter tells a story of cruelty and fundamentalism. Here the story told by the Iranian refugee (on stage, in Arabic or Persian according to Khemiri’s direction): Den enda trösten som jag har kvar är musiken... [...] Musiken har alltid funnits där och aldrig övergivit mig... [...] Jag och Saber, min yngsta bror, hade en popgrupp när vi var små... [...] Nu när allt är som tyngst, är musiken min tröst... (Khemiri, Invasion!, 117) (“The only thing that can still console me is music... […] The music has always been there and it has never abandoned me… […] Saber, my youngest brother and I, had a rock group when we were little […] Now when everything has become so difficult to deal with, I can always count on music to come to my rescue…” Perry, Invasion!, 179) The interpreter changes the man’s story with these words: Sverige är ändå mycket bättre än mitt hemland. [...] Jag kommer från en tämligen terroristisk bakgrund. [...] Jag och Saber, min yngsta bror, brukade leka självmordsbombare redan som små. [...] Min far var mycket ond, jag valde att vända mitt fadershat mot omgivningen. (Khemiri, Invasion!, 117) (“But Sweden is nevertheless a great deal better than my homeland. […] There was quite a lot of terrorist activity in my background. […] Saber, my youngest brother and I, used to pretend to be suicide bombers even when we were very young […] My father was very cruel, I decided to turn my hatred of my father against the world around me.” Perry, Invasion!, 179) 126 The audience cannot be conscious of the deceit until intelligible words (such as Pavarotti, Jussi Björling, Aida, Abba…) are used by the Arabic/Persian speaker, but are not present in the translation. Moreover the refugee sings some lines of Abba’s Mamma Mia and Bang a Boomerang, which are completely ignored by the interpreter. Even the apple picker realizes that something is amiss and tests the interpreter with a few other lines from Waterloo and SOS, none of which are translated and he gives up recounting his story while the interpreter adds more and more lies: C/TOLKEN Jag skickade ut en hälsning till en annan stor man av handling... Hitler. Paus som hon väntar på att ÄPPELPLOCKAREN ska tala klart. C/TOLKEN Jag avslutade med att säga att attacken mot World Trade Center var en enda stor kupp av judiska konspiratörer, allt för att tvinga USA till krig mot arabvärlden. Paus som hon väntar på att ÄPPELPLOCKAREN ska tala klart. C/TOLKEN När videokassetten var klar spände jag på mig dynamitbälter och lämnade mitt hem. Paus som hon väntar på att ÄPPELPLOCKAREN ska tala klart. C/TOLKEN Jag tänkte saker som kvinnlig omskärelse – det är en trevlig tradition som borde spridas världen över. Paus som hon väntar på att ÄPPELPLOCKAREN ska tala klart. C/TOLKEN Jag tänker klotoris är verkligen som en rosenbuske... Den måste beskäras för att kunna blomstra! Paus som hon väntar på att ÄPPELPLOCKAREN ska tala klart. C/TOLKEN Jag tänkte: Om jag hade en son skulle han heta Saddam. Eller Usama. Eller både och. Som ett dubbelnamn. (Khemiri, Invasion!, 120-121) (“C I broadcast a greeting to another great man of action: Hitler. (Pause as though she were waiting for A to finish talking.) C I rounded things off by saying that the attack on the World Trade Centre was one vast plot on the part of Jewish conspirators, the whole thing orchestrated to make the US go to war against the Arab world. (Pause as though she were waiting for A to finish talking.) C When the videotape was finished. I fastened the dynamite belt around my body and left my home. (Pause as though she were waiting for A to finish talking.) C I was thinking things like: female circumcision – a lovely tradition that should be spread across the entire world. (Pause as though she were waiting for A to finish talking.) 127 C I was struck by the idea that the clitoris is really like a rosebush… It has to be pruned if it is to blossom. (Pause as though she were waiting for A to finish talking.) C And I thought, if I had a son he would be called Saddam. Or Osama. Or both. Sort of like a double-barrelled name.” Perry, Invasion!, 182-183) The refugee can at this point only endeavour to say that he does not agree with what the interpreter has been stating but his insufficient knowledge of Swedish only allows him to stutter: “Inte mera krig. Inte bra… Många krig, många våld… Talk inte bra… […]” (Khemiri, Invasion!, 121) (”Not more war… Not good… Many war, many violence… Interpreter not good… […]” Perry, Invasion!, 183). However, the audience has already understood that the interpreter is not reliable and the effect is impressive – the audience is certain that they have been misled but they do not really know what the true story is. The acknowledgment of ignorance that is experienced by the audience has to also be seen as a metaphor for the priggish Swedish society which tends to assume immigrants’ backgrounds to be homogeneous and stereotyped – since Swedes expect immigrants to have a common cruel and tragic story, they are usually deaf to their individual diversity. 5.3 INDIVIDUALITY AND IDENTITY IN INVASION! In the play Invasion! Khemiri has examined the meaning of individuality as he has done in all his novels. The obsessively used name Abulkasem hints at the author’s interest in identity confusion and disorientation: due to the fact that the name is used interchangeably by very different people it loses its role as a marker of identity and 128 according to Peter Leonard it becomes “highly marked as exotic and unusual, yet this very exoticism allows it to stand for any and every Middle Easterner, from the “Turk in the leather vest” at the up-and-coming female director. This polyvalence is […] a symbol of the ambiguity and unsettled relationship between a Nordic society and individual middle easterners, be they abroad, in refugee camps, or living next door.”229 No one is immune to this generalization, and in the third scene Lara, who is very annoyed by her friends’ prejudices, names a famous Muslim film director Abulkasem, borrowing it from the young man who had flirted with her before: Plötsligt får jag en blackout. Hennes namn är borta. Och istället hör jag mig säga: ”Ni har väl alla hört talas om... om... om... A... A-A-Abulkasem? Har ni inte?” Vad skulle jag göra? Jag var tvungen att säga någonting. Och först efteråt inser jag att jag lånat namnet från turken i skinnväst. (Khemiri, Invasion!, 104) (“… all of a sudden I get this blackout. Her name has gone blank. And I hear myself saying instead, “And of course you’ll all heard of… of… of… A… A-A-Abulkasem, haven’t you?” What was I supposed to do? I had to say something. And it was later on I realized that I had borrowed the name from that Turk in the leather jacket.” Perry, Invasion!, 165) As prejudices nullify individual differences, so the name Abulkasem eradicates the individuality of those who use it and there is no resistance to its contagion. Abulkasem becomes the scapegoat that the experts use in scene six to justify the rise in the number of rapes, the increase in insurance frauds, and even to explain the number of pot-holes in the streets which continues to climb. This metaphorical generalization is evident when the experts cannot identify Abulkasem in a picture portraying some detainees: “[…] och Abulkasem är… Nu ska vi se… Det är lite Peter Leonard, “Identity and its Discontents: Corporeal Indexicality in Claus Beck-Nielsen and Jonas Khemiri”, 7, accessed April 10, 2013, http://home.uchicago.edu/psleonar/identity-discontents-ku.pdf. 229 129 svårt att se skillnad på dom men... Abulkasem är han… Det måste det vara… […] Eller kanske han… Nej, han är det nog…” (Khemiri, Invasion!, 125) (”[...] and Abulkasem is... Now let me see... I admit it is a bit difficult to tell them apart but... That one is Abulkasem… That’s got to be him… […] then again it could be that one… no, no that’s him right enough…” Perry, Invasion!, 185). The overused name Abulkasem is also taken by the apple picker when he is caught by the police. The refugee does not simply nullify his individuality by using a name that has been overused in the previous scenes, but in addition burns his fingertips as an extreme action to also deny his identity. Without his fingertips, he cannot be identified and sent back to his homeland. Here, the idea of generalization and absence of individuality that we have seen clashes with the opposing idea of diversification, which stands for identity. The definition of one’s individuality implies the definition of his/her inclinations, backgrounds, and psychology, while identity can be easily reduced to a mere political concept needed by the state to control its people. So while generalization and prejudices can spread around the country without creating any serious damage to society, defining identity is a central problem for every bureaucratic state, such as Sweden. Peter Leonard analyses Khemiri’s play in relation to Giorgio Agamben’s philosophy of bare and political life, and in so doing finds many interesting similarities.230 Through further development of an ancient Greek belief about life, Agamben supports the idea that everyone has two forms of life: life in a biological sense (zoe) and life in a political sense (bios). According to our Western tradition, the most important of these two is actually bios, since this is the one that sets us apart from animals. The bare life, which was originally situated 230 Leonard, “Identity and its Discontents”. 130 outside the political life, started to coincide gradually with bios until they could no longer be separated: for instance our political identity is determined by our fingertips.231 Leonard argues that the apple picker is defined by the Swedish state as completely outside the political system because of the impossibility of being tracked, and he falls into the most basic category of politics: a mere body. Sweden, which has the power to interfere with people’s bare life, can also define individuals as completely outside of the welfare state and consequently a state which is supposedly at the apotheosis of Western humanism also has a contradictory enormous dehumanizing potential.232 In Invasion!, the name Abulkasem symbolizes exclusion and prejudice, and it questions our responsibility in the systematic diffusion of stereotypes and racism. None of the characters, not even the well educated Lara, found the way to stop the diffusion of the name which spreads rapidly and without any opposition. The play is therefore not only a stance against racism but rather a starting point for the viewer to question him/herself on whether he/she has perpetuated segregation perhaps without being aware. Within the play there are neither victims (except the refugee) nor villains (apart from the interpreter), only a group of normal people whose guilt is proportioned to their innocence. This realistic portrait of common people, who are neither too good nor too evil, hints to the fact that Invasion! wants actually to open a discussion about social issues and not simply to give an answer to these problems. 231 232 Giorgio Agamben, Homo sacer. Il potere sovrano e la nuda vita (Torino: Einaudi, 2005). Leonard, “Identity and its Discontents”, 11. 131 5.4 SOCIAL CRITICISM IN FEM GÅNGER GUD AND IN APATISKA FÖR NYBÖRJARE While social criticism in Invasion! is partially implicit, Khemiri’s plays Fem gånger gud and Apatiska för nybörjare explicitly criticize Swedish society. Fem gånger gud is about a drama teacher, Rolf, and his four students, who in turn direct a play within the play. Since each of them has the possibility to decide whatever they want to do on stage, they all have the chance to play “god.” 233 Idris (whose name probably alludes to the Hindu god Indra) recounts in his scene what he would tell god if they met on Earth. God, who is personified in the rapper MC Hammer’s and performed by Olivia, is convinced by one of his angels, performed by Rolf, that the only fair country on Earth is Sweden. They subsequently descend from heaven and meet Idris, who argues why Sweden is not such an ideal land: Jag ska berätta för er om det här landet. [...] Det här landet är en tvångströja. Det här landet är feghetens falskhetens kompromissens jävla helvete. [...] Om ni kollar noga så ser ni att det här alltså INTE är de tåg som rullade kors och tvärs över Sverige under andra världskriget. Och de fraktade INTE järn och stål till Nazi-Tyskland. [...] Och att järnexporten skulle ha varit 90% av vår utrikeshandel är en fullständig lögn. Nej nej, vi var neutrala här! [...] Det där är alltså INTE passen som Sverige krävde att Tyskland skulle införa redan före andra världskriget. Passen som enligt svenska direktiv skulle märkas med ett synligt J om man var jude. Passen som i praktiken gjorde det omöjligt för judar att söka skydd i Sverige. [...] Och snart ändrades faktiskt lagarna så att till och med judar fick komma in i Sverige. Redan 1942, faktiskt. [...] Vilken lång historia av öppenhet vi har i vårt land. Bara 12 år senare fick till och med zigenare komma in! [...] om vi tar vänster så ser ni en särskild barack där vi INTE samlar skriken från de 63000 människor som 233 Giving to each character the chance to direct a part of the play, makes Fem gånger Gud a beautiful pastiche of Strindberg’s Ett drömspel (A Dreamplay, 1902). Like Strindberg, Khemiri plays with the concept of time and its linearity, and the result is a dreamlike plot which goes from one character to another without any apparent scheming. Not only does the presence of God recall Indra’s voice in Ett drömspel, it also indicates the artist’s (in this case playwright’s) peculiar power to create something out of nothing – as much as God created the world out of chaos, a playwright can create a play out of apparently chaotic stories. 132 svenska staten INTE tvångssteriliserade... [...] Det är alltså här som vi INTE har låst in Idris två frihetskämpande bröder och det var INTE för att de inte hade råd med advokat och dessutom var en av dem skyldig. (Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 209-211) (I will tell you about this land. […] This land is a straitjacket. This land is the fucking hell of cowardice, falsity, and compromise. […] If you look carefully, you can see that this is NOT the train that rolled back and forth across Sweden during the Second World War, and they did NOT carry iron and steel to Nazi Germany. […] And that iron exportation was 90% of our foreign trade is an absolute lie. No no, we were neutral! […] Those ones are NOT the passports that Germany was requested to introduce by Sweden already before the Second World War. Passports which according to Swedish directive would be marked with a visible J if one was Jewish. The passports that basically made it impossible for Jewish people to find protection in Sweden. […]) And soon the law was changed so that even Jewish people were allowed to come to Sweden. Already in 1942 actually. […] Our land has such a long story of openness! Only 12 years later even gypsies could come here. […] if we take the left, you can see a special barracks where we do NOT collect the screams of 63000 people that Sweden did NOT sterilize… […] It is here that we have NOT imprisoned Idris’s two brothers who fought for freedom and it was NOT because they had no money for a lawyer and moreover one of them was guilty.) Idris criticizes Sweden very openly and exposes the deep-rooted utopia of Sweden as a neutral country. What Khemiri knows best is that positive prejudices may be harder to eradicate than negative ones, and ridicules the priggish Swedish society through Rolf’s annoying behavior. While Idris criticizes Sweden, Rolf defends his country with ridiculous judgments on Swedish superiority: Men här i landet har ni väl ändå kommit väldigt långt vad gäller jämställdhet och demokrati? Här kan man väl nästan säga att alla är så räddhågset politiskt korrekta att förtrycket nästan har vänts ut och in? [...] Jag vet inget annat land som är mer neutralt, öppet, jämlikt... (Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 209) (But in this country you still have come very far as to gender equality and democracy, right? Here one can surely almost say that everyone is so fearfully politically correct that the oppression has almost been turned inside out […] I don’t know any other country that is more neutral, open, and equal…) 133 In the play, a clear stance about Sweden is never taken: some characters highlight its goodness whilst others represent it in a more negative way. Sweden does not appear however as a land that is entirely despicable but the suggestion that the author seems to pass on to his audience is that it is time to open a free and conscious discussion about what works well in the country and what has to be changed. This need for selfexamination sometimes finds dissent in characters such as Rolf, who tends to minimize the problems, over-applauding the democratic victories that people have achieved in the Nordic countries. What the audience should perceive is that Khemiri refuses the stances that are both too positive and too negative, because these do not lead to any kind of productive discussion. The playwright’s aim to represent reality and people as realistically as possible is obvious in the play Apatiska för nyborjare. This play is about an investigator who narrates his234 research about the case of an apathetic immigrant daughter of asylum refugees in Sweden. The name of the little girl is Mariana Kaurova and she came from Naltjik (Georgia). The investigator is often followed by a character called rösten (the voice) who represents his inner conscience and continuously bothers him to bring into question the facts regarding Mariana. Facts are narrated through a series of flashbacks where different people tell different versions of the story. In scene 4, the story of the immigrant office employee who worked on the case is narrated by her son and daughters, and by the son of an immigrant family who she has helped. She is described as a very strong woman who believed in a fair country, where immigrants could have access to Sweden’s wealth. However, after meeting a refugee 234 In the characters list, the investigator is indicated as a man or a woman. However the indication for a woman is into brackets, suggesting that the investigator is likely to be played by a man. Moreover, since the play has been inspired by Gellert Tamas’ book, the investigator probably reminds of Tamas himself. From now on, the investigator will be considered as a man. 134 who pretended to be in love with her just to get a resident permit, she became more and more skeptical towards immigrants. She subsequently becomes the national coordinator for the apathetic refugee children, named directly by the government. She then starts a campaign to show that the parents had poisoned the children in order to be able to stay in Sweden. In the play her son and daughters try to change her mind, to tell her that she was wrong, misled by the support of other important personalities of the time, such as psychologists and politicians. Finally, at the end of the scene, she refuses to bear the responsibility alone for having sent sick children out of the country, and her daughter says that she “kanske bara var en kugge i ett större maskineri” (Khemiri, Apatiska) (was maybe just a gear in a bigger engine), referring to the idea that evil cannot be done by just one person but that it is the result of a complex situation where nobody can consider themselves innocent. The same kind of generalization of guilt applies in scene 6, where the Migration Minister is accused of having been wrong, and the actress who plays her role tries to justify the Minister’s mistake with these words: Men tänk om jag vill säga något helt annat? Tänk om jag vill säga det som alla sitter och tänker? Tänk om jag skulle försvara henne på samma sätt som jag skulle försvara mig? Vad exakt VAD är det som ni inte förstår? Världen består av sex miljarder människor. Vi har ett socialt trygghetssystem som knappt täcker nio mijlioner invånare. En miljard är tusen miljoner. Fattar ni inte vad som skulle hända om vi öppnade upp gränserna? Inser ni inte konsekvenserna? [...] Det sociala skyddsnätet skulle kollapsa. På två sekunder. Ni vet det. Jag vet det. Alla vet det! Den ekonomiska världsordningen skulle erövra ännu ett område. Inser ni inte att hon. Eller jag. Gjorde det oundvikliga? (Khemiri, Apatiska) (But think if I wanted to say something completely different? Think if I wanted to say what you all here are thinking about. Think I would defend her in the same way I would defend myself. WHAT is it exactly that you don’t understand? There are six billion people in the world. We have a social security system that barely covers nine million inhabitants. A billion is one 135 thousand million. Don’t you understand what would happen if we opened the borders? Don’t you imagine the consequences? […] Our social security would collapse in two seconds. You know it. I know it. Everybody knows it! The economic world order would conquer one more area. Can’t you realize that I, I mean she, did what was inevitable?) At this point in the play, the actress who plays the Minister switches from her role to the role of a generic actress who wants to justify the Minister’s decisions. Doing so, she describes the Minister as a person whose limits prevent her from being genuinely good, but whose egoism is shared by everybody and is therefore impossible to condemn. Khemiri aims again to represent realistic characters who are not idealized but whose humanity inspires compassion in his audience. The problem with these realistic individuals is that they cannot solve any of the social issues that the plays present, and the viewers are requested to think about them without prejudices and to awaken their sense of right and wrong. 5.5 THEATRICAL DIS-ILLUSION IN KHEMIRI’S PLAYS The three plays which have been analysed here are political in the sense that they discuss relevant public issues of contemporary Sweden. However, Khemiri raises uncomfortable questions rather than proposing solutions or political visions. He is absolutely political in the provocative way he unmasks shortcomings and hypocrisy in the purportedly progressive and open Swedish mentality and social organization. Khemiri does have strong views and beliefs about all this, although he is himself a Swede and does not certainly want to dismantle the Swedish Welfare State. His play are actually structured to give as few indications as possible in the arosen debate and 136 Khemiri never gives any moralistic teachings, but rather wants to awaken his audience’s awareness and in order to reinforce this awakening he has constructed his theatrical work on stage disillusion. It is important to consider that everything that takes place on stage holds a special meaning that aims to be perceived by the audience. In other words we can say that from a semiotic point of view, all the objects on stage are charged with a higher significance than when they belong to everyday life. 235 At the same time, every word said and every movement made by the actors are designed by either the playwright or the director to communicate a message to their audience.236 The fact that Khemiri’s plays lack any form of set design and that objects are rarely used on stage is really powerful. This lack of significant objects increases the importance of words enormously and the actors as mediums of significance – the audience can indeed only focus on what actors say and do on stage. This once again proves Khemiri’s intense interest in language, and although the author pays very much attention on what concerns the performance (such as rhythm), he disregards the scenographic element. The power to communicate information is generally shared on stage by a complex sign system, but this complexity is highly reduced in Khemiri’s work, for instance the only scripted object in Fem gånger gud (a manuscript used by the characters on stage) acquires extreme relevance – it constantly communicates to the audience that they are watching theatrical fiction. Khemiri denies entirely the Aristotelian idea of theatre which considers tragedy to be imitative and that presumes 235 236 Keir Elam, Semiotica del teatro (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1988), 15. Elam, Semiotica, 74-75. 137 the actors to act and not to describe their actions. 237 According to the Greek philosopher, tragedy arouses pity and fear and it is meant to effect catharsis, 238 moreover, as a consequence, the audience is expected to empathize with the actors and to forget that they are looking at a performance. The spectator becomes then a passive observer as long as the theatrical illusion remains intact, but Khemiri insists on the lie that is beneath this idea, and through several expedients he breaks the deceptive veil between stage and audience. In Invasion!, two actors are asked to enter the foyer from the street and to pretend to be part of the public. They are also explicitly asked to be loud, rude, and gross: I FOAJÉN YOUSEF och ARVIND kommer in i foajén från gatan, iklädda kepsar och mjukisbyxor. De har varsitt McDonald’s-sugror och några pappersservetter, blåser tuggade papperstussar på varandra. Puttar in varandra i andra åskådare, hotstirrar om någon säger till. Går runti i foajén, är högljuda, raggar på någon tjej (”ey bruden, du är fin, kom sitt med oss, vi har vipsäten, jao”.) (Khemiri, Invasion!, 76) (“IN THE FOYER Yousef (D) and Arvind (B) come into the theatre foyer from the street, dressed in baseball caps and track-suit bottoms. They are each holding a McDonald’s straw and some paper napkins; they blow chewed-up bits of paper at each other. They knock one another into members of the audience; they look threateningly at anyone who answers back. They walk around the foyer, making a lot of noise, putting the moves on the odd girl (Ey, baby, you are so fine, come and sit with us, we know the guy what wrote the play,239 we’ve got VIP-seats, yo baby.” Perry, Invasion!, 137) This smart device breaks the sanctioned wall between the actors and the public, and the latter is here forced to actively interact with the characters. Yousef’s and “Tragedia è, dunque, imitazione di un’azione elevata e conclusa […] la tragedia è imitazione di un’azione ed è compiuta da persone che agiscono […]” Aristotele, Poetica (Milano: Mondadori, 2011), 15. 238 Aristotele, Poetica, 15. 239 The sentence “we know the guy what wrote the play” is not actually present in the original text. 237 138 Arvind’s aggressiveness is justified as a means to perpetuate in the audience the rooted stereotype of vulgar and annoying immigrants – the actors have indeed to be young (between twenty and twenty-five years old) and Middle Easterner. Even the McDonald’s straws have a powerful connotation: since McDonald sells very cheap food, it is associated with young people from city suburbs. If Yousef and Arvind were real, they could have had dinner at McDonald’s before going to theatre, and the author wants this situation to be as realistic as possible. The Aristotelian imitationrule is then ignored since the action is real, and their behavior, which is meant to oppose any good rules of behaviour, reaches the climax when they interrupt the performance. This interruption acquires more meaning if we consider that the bourgeois theatre is based on the rule that while the performance is on, the audience has to remain quiet (except for applauses and laughs).240 Furthermore in Fem gånger gud, a manuscript is often read by the actors on stage, describing the action and anticipating their monologues and discussions. For instance Rolf reads out loud the stage direction that describes how his character should appear: “Det stod ju ‘nervös dramlärare som ingen respekterar’ och nu spelade jag mer ‘nervös’ […]” (Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 187) (But it says ‘nervous theatre teacher that no one respects’ and now I pretend to be more ‘nervous’.). Immediately after, Blanca tells Sanoj that he has to pretend to be a bench, 241 explains stage positions to the other characters242 and reminds them of their lines.243 The fact that this play is about a theatre teacher and his students, of course, makes Fem gånger gud particularly suitable for theatrical interferences, but it also serves an 240 Caprara, Il teatro, 57-58. “BLANCA Ja, just det. Du spelar bänken.” Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 187. 242 “BLANCA Den som spelar Rolf stör Blanca när hon förberender sig.” Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 187. 243 “BLANCA Den som spelar Blanca säger: Varsågoda.” Khemiri, Fem gånger gud, 187. 241 139 extradiegetic aim: the interruption of the theatrical illusion. Khemiri wants to avoid his public being deceived by the power of theatre that makes what is actually only fiction look real. We may say that he shares Bertolt Brecht’s fear that theatre could cause the spectator’s to identify emotionally with the characters, without provoking a critical response.244 Khemiri, as Brecht, employs various techniques that remind the audience that the play is a representation and not reality – by focusing on the constructed nature of theatre, Khemiri tries to cause a strong and rational reaction in the spectators. This fear is also explicitly referred to in the last scene of Apatiska för nybörjare, where two old classmates of the investigator say that they have seen a play based on his research. Not only is this a metatheatrical reference to Khemiri’s play itself, but it also serves the aim to represent a possible audience reaction that Khemiri would like to avoid. The classmates admit that they loved the play and that it was “bra att den tog tydlig ställning” (Khemiri, Apatiska) (good that it took a clear position). Immediately after, one of them suggests going to drink a glass of wine. These lines ridicule both the reviewers’ habit of claiming that Khemiri’s play are political and that the author takes a clear position in the social debates arising from his works, and the audience’s habit of rapidly going back to their life and avoiding any critical response to the plays. It is not a coincidence, that in the very last part of Apatiska för nybörjare, the voice – which represents the investigator’s conscience, as was previously mentioned, and maybe everybody’s conscience – screams “HJииииииииLP” (Khemiri, Apatiska) (heeeeeeeelp), recalling the audience’s problematic apathy towards social issues. 244 Caprara, Il teatro, 90-91. 140 In Khemiri’s theatre, metatheatricality serves the aim of awakening people’s awareness and opening up discussions. At the same time, the author avoids giving solutions, even though he takes a radical position against prejudices and discrimination, leaving the spectators free to draw their own conclusions. *** Through his plays, Khemiri shows to the audience some realistic circumstances where the Swedish welfare state doesn’t guarantee dignity and independence to the people. He brings on the stage some stories that prove that discrimination and racial exclusion still exist in Sweden, although many Swedes consider their land as the most fair and right country on earth. These people are the ones that Khemiri wants to upset, and through a series of metatheatrical expedients he aims to awake their undisturbed conscience. Each person of the audience is thus expected to start a discussion and to reconsider their social responsibility and guilt, or at least to consider their indifference to the important problems that are sometimes underestimated. Khemiri puts on stage young people that often have immigrant origins and are at the edge of society. However, he does not want them to be pitied, and therefore his characters are also realistic and always speak their weaknesses. Some of them are even annoying to disturb the calm of the prig society. Besides this social intent, it is also true that Khemiri cares very much about the form of his plays (such as structure, rhythm, dialogue…). But this is an aspect that has rarely been mentioned by critics who, on the contrary, have only focused on the 141 political value of Khemiri’s theatre. Since the critics expect an invandrarförfattare to be mainly a political artist, they have partially ignored the aesthetic features and the existential questions that arise from Invasion!, Fem gånger gud, and Apatiska för nybörjare. 142 143 CONCLUSION The Swedish critics have exerted an oppressive power by using the prefix invandrarto define some writers including Jonas Hassen Khemiri, because by doing so, they have leveled out the many differences that exist among the so called immigrant writers. Consequently, they all have become the representatives of a minority group of second generation of immigrants, willingly or not. This thesis aims to seek the consequences that the prefix invandrar- has had on the literary reception of Khemiri’s works and on the author’s own strategies to reply to the assumption. Khemiri's label as invandrarförfattare has prevented the critics from fully understanding his works, because they could not get rid of three metaphorical lenses imposed by the definition of invandrarlitteratur itself, that tend to enlarge some literary features while they minimize some others. These lenses – that have been defined as the sociolinguistic lens, the autobiographical lens, and the political lens – correspond to the fact that the critics expect the invandrarförfattare to use a language that directly represent the idiolects used by people in Swedish multiethnic suburbs, to always create autobiographical characters, and to aim to undermine the Swedish white establishment. The fact that the Swedish critics perpetuate these three prejudices has been proved through the analysis of Khemiri’s novels. As soon as Khemiri’s first novel came out, critics labeled its language as a reliable representation of the Swedish idiolects spoken by young people in immigrants suburbs. As we have seen they share indeed many features, for instance 144 the rak ordföljd efter fundament (straight word order after foundation), but since Halim tends to exaggerate the characteristics of his blattesvenska, we have argued that he tries to reproduce such an idiolect in his diary even though he has not always spoken in this way and is actually a Swedish native speaker. In other words, Halim uses his significant linguistic resources as a conscious act of resistance against what he calls swedification. On the contrary, all the critics who considered Halim’s language as a real representation of blattesvenska have misunderstood the author’s aim, even because in real life blattesvenska is always used by blattar to express affiliation and solidarity to their mates, while Halim often glorifies himself as a tankesultan who is superior to anybody else. Similarly, Kadir’s language in Montecore could be perceived as a literary transposition of the broken Swedish spoken by Arabic immigrants. But as we have seen, Kadir’s language is too finely constructed and often too poetic, and this proves that Khemiri did not want to depict the real invandrarsvenska but rather explore the playfulness of language. The novel Montecore has also been used to demonstrate how Khemiri rejected the critics’ misconception of Ett öga rött, which expects his characters to be autobiographical. To do this, we have considered Astrid Trotzig’s critical essays which explains that ethnically Swedish writers are valued for their individuality, and they are expected to portray both themselves and the world in a universal way through their works. On the contrary, the invandrarförfattare are expected to limit themselves to depict their very personal point of view and no weight is given to their capacity to explore and define society and the world at large, but only to the ethnic perspective, which is only valid for immigrants or, at most, for Swedes with 145 multicultural background. The semi-autobiographical novel Montecore is thus a stance against the misconception that indissolubly links a writer to his protagonist, and from this point of view it is a form of protest against the critics who had previously considered Halim as Khemiri’s alter ego. Finally, with Jag ringer mina bröder, we have seen how critics tend to categorise Khemiri’s works always giving a political reading. Even though Amor’s story evolves on different levels (a social level and a personal level), the reviews have showed an incapacity to go beyond the political criticism of the writer, leveling out the multi-layer structure of the novel. Not only does the problematic prefix invandrar- prove to be a social bias, but it also prevents critics from more deeply analysing and understanding the so called invandrarlitteratur. A certain need for schematization is implicit in the literary critique, especially in the case of newspaper reviews, and therefore literary critics have tended to classify writers according to their style, language, and topics. This may be helpful to better understand the writers’ works and to give shape to the chaotic world of literature, that would be otherwise almost impregnable. But such a necessity can become problematic when it promotes an absolute categorization. The real problem of the definition of invandrarlitteratur is indeed within the prefix, because the prefix itself influences the reception of the literature it defines and it distorts its meaning. Although I do not personally like the idea that everything has to be labeled, I do understand the desire to create certain categories in order to organize what is a multifaceted reality. If Khemri was simply called a svensk författare (Swedish 146 writer) instead of an invandrarförfattare, his literature would perhaps be analysed more fully and it would not have to face oversimplifications. It is a pity that Khemiri’s valuable novels and plays need a prefix to enter the sphere of contemporary Swedish literature. 147 SVENSK SAMMANFATTNING När svenska kritiker använder prefixet invandrar- för att kategorisera författare tycks det vara bevis på ett tryckande maktutövande. En person som ofta får denna stämpel är Jonas Hassen Khemiri som inte anses vara helsvensk på grund av sin fars tunisiska ursprung. Detta har i sin tur lett till att Khemiri företrätt andra generations invandrare, om så frivilligt eller ej. Den här uppsasten syftar till att påvisa och konkretisera de konsekvenser som prefixet invandrar- har och har haft i mottagandet av Khemiris litterära verk. Det problematiska prefixet invandrar- visar sig vara en social fördom, samtidigt som begreppet också hindrar kritiker från en full förståelse av den så kallade invandrarlitteraturen. Prefixet påverkar kritikernas uppfattning om litteraturen samtidigt som det ger en snedvriden bild av dess innebörd, vilket pekar på att problemet ligger i själva prefixet. Vidare diskuteras att definitionen av invandrarlitteratur alltid för med sig tre typer av huvudförväntningar: a) språket som används av invandrarförfattare är en tillförlitlig bild av invandrarsvenskan som människor talar i svenska multietniska förorter, b) invandrarförfattare tenderar att skapa självbiografiska figurer, c) invandrarlitteraturens viktigaste konsekvenser är politiska, eftersom dess författare syftar till att undergräva det vita och borgerliga etablissemanget. Dessa förväntningar har hindrat svenska kritiker från att objektivt analysera Khemiris romaner och teatrar, vilket framkommer i uppsatsen. 148 I en genomförd analys av Ett öga rött (2003), har jag bevisat att språket som författaren har använt består av ett flertal estetiska konnotationer som inte enbart speglar invandrarsvenskan. Vidare i analysen har det uppmärksammats att Montecore (2006) döljer ett ironisk och självbiografisk uppsåt som skarpt slår ner på de kritiker som antog att Halim (huvudpersonen i Ett öga rött) representerades av Khemiris alter ego. Avslutningsvis förs en diskussion om Khemiris verk Jag ringer mina bröder (2012), i vilken det har bevisats att det politiska temat är minst lika relevant som de övriga temana. Faktum är att kritikernas fokus har utgått ifrån en politiska aspekt och har helt missat de sociala, däribland huvudpersonens relationer och vänskapsband. Även om den här uppsatsen mest ger en fördjupad bild av Khemiris romaner, avslutas den med ett kapitel som enbart behandlar Khemiris teatraliska litteratur. Kapitlet ger således en överblick i hans storhet även som dramatiker. Eftersom det är svårt att hitta svenskt källmaterial angående den moderna litteraturen, bestämde jag mig för att använda diverse typer av material i arbetet. Det betyder att jag även har inkluderat intervjuer och recensioner i tidskrifter och tidningar. Samtidigt har jag utgått ifrån ett narratologiskt perspektiv i min analys, eftersom jag främst vill uppmärksamma de italienska läsarna om Khemiris okända verk. Jag har dock alltid försökt att följa två röda trådar som återfinns i Khemiris romaner och teatrar: i första hand rör det sig om hans intresse för mänskliga och familjära band, i andra om karaktärers behov av att definiera sig själva som en del av världen. 149 Den här uppsatsen visar också på min stora tillgivenhet för Khemiris litteratur som alltid är skickligt skriven, intensiv och gripande. Förutom det som prefixet invandrar- definerar och antyder, är Khemiri en utmärkt författare, inte bara på grund av sin förmåga att behärska det svenska språket på en hög nivå, men också på grund av sin förmåga att utforska den mänskliga själen i sina litterära verk. 150 151 BIBLIOGRAPHY Primary, secondary, web sources PRIMARY SOURCES - Khemiri, Jonas Hassen. Apatiska för nybörjare. Private copy kindly given by the author. - Khemiri, Jonas Hassen. Ett öga rött. Stockholm: Norstedts, 2003. - Khemiri, Jonas Hassen. Fem gånger gud. In Invasion. Pjäser, noveller, texter, 171248. 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Accessed September 19, 2013. http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/teater/article11539900.ab. - Bondesson, Mikael. ”Brand totalförstörde kulturhuset Cyklopen”. Dagens Nyheter, November 29, 2008. Accessed September 2, 2013. http://www.webcitation.org/5cp2Fd4ds. - Borger, Julian. "Stockholm bombing". The Guardian, December 12, 2010. Accessed September 3, 2013. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/12/stockholmbombing-policing-lone-jihadists. 156 - Bromander, Lennart. “Hög puls bevarar omedelbarheten”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Skånska Dagbladet, October 17, 2012. http://www.skanskan.se/article/20121017/NOJE/710179926/-/hog-puls-bevararomedelbarheten. - Burns, John F. and Ravi Somaiya. "Police Say Early Detonation of Bomb Averted Disaster in Sweden". The New York Times, December 13, 2010. Accessed September 3, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/world/europe/14sweden.html?hp&_r=0. - Eklöf, Jonas. “I väntan på inspiration”. Vi laser, 2009. Accessed January, 20, 2013. http://www.khemiri.se/assets/0000/0696/jhk-intervju-vi-laser-hosten-2009.pdf. - Eriksson, Magnus. “En grimas åt alla – och åt ingen”. Review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Svenksa Dagbladet, February 6, 2006. Accessed May 30, 2013. http://www.svd.se/kultur/litteratur/en-grimas-at-alla-och-at-ingen_32431.svd. - Eriksson, Magnus. ”Platt text om bombdådet i Stockholm”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Svenska Dagbladet, October 16, 2012. http://www.svd.se/kultur/litteratur/platt-text-om-bombdadet-i-stockhilm_758429 0.svd. - Fegan, Ali. “Dom tar våra ord”. Arena 5, 2004. - Grode, Eric. “Subversive Tongue and a Sharp Focus on Identity Politics”. Review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. New York Times, September 8, 2011. Accessed March 15, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/theater/jonashassen-khemiri-the-playwright-behind-invasion.html. - Jakubowski, Matthew. “Words of my father: Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s Montecore”. Review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. The National, February 18, 2011. Accessed May 10, 2013. http://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/books/ words-of-my-father-jonas-hassen-khemiris-montecore#page1. - Karlsson, Johanna. ”Jag ringer mina bröder, Jonas Hassen Khemiri”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Bokhora.se, October 30. Accessed September 12, 2013. http://bokhora.se/2012/jag-ringer-mina-broder-jonas-hassen-khemiri/. 157 - Kleen (af), Björn.”Hassen Khemiri vill uppfinna sig själv”. Sydsvenskan, February 4, 2006. Accessed May 30, 2013. http://www.sydsvenskan.se/kultur--nojen/hassenkhemiri-vill-uppfinna-sig-sjalv/. - Koldenius, Annika. ”Recension: Jag ringer mina bröder av Jonas Hasen Khemiri”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Borås Tidning, October 16, 2012. Accessed September 12, 2013. http://annikakoldenius.wordpress.com/2012/10/16/recension-jag-ringer-minabroder-av-jonas-hassen-khemiri/. - Granath, Sara. “Inbilska elever speglar oss”. Review of Fem gånger gud, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Svenska Dagbladet, October 5, 2008. Accessed September 19, 2013. http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/inbilska-elever-speglar-oss_1833621.svd. - Granath, Sarah. ”Känslostark utmaning av teatern”. Review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Svenska Dagbladet, March 11, 2006. Accessed September 18, 2013. http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/kanslostark-utmaning-av-teatern_298418.svd. - Grode, Eric. “Subversive Tongue and a Sharp Focus on Identity Politics”. Review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. New York Times, September 11, 2011. Accessed September 18, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/theater/jonas-hassen-khemiri-theplaywright-behind-invasion.html. - Hoppe, Karoline. “Svårt att förstå att det verkligen kan vara han”. Dagens Nyheter, December 13, 2010. Accessed September 3, 2013. http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/svart-att-forsta-att-det-verkligen-kan-varahan/. - Hanson, Matilda E. and Catarina Håkansson. ”Man sprängde sig själv i Stockholm”. Svenska Dagbladet, December 11, 2010. Accessed September 3, 2013. http://www.svd.se/nyheter/inrikes/man-sprangde-sig-sjalv-i-stockholm_ 5802915.svd. - Harrison Wallace, Charles. “Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Montecore: en unik tiger”. Review of Montecore, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Swedishbookreview, January, 2008. Accessed May, 12, 2013. http://www.swedishbookreview.com/show-review.php?i=188. 158 - Littorin, Jens; Stefan Lisinski; and Andres Hellberg. “Kvinnorna sköts genom fönster”. Dagens Nyheter, October 22, 2010. Accessed August 28, 2013. http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/kvinnorna-skots-genom-fonstret/. - Lucas, Eve. “The trickery of the truth teller”. Exberliner, February 1, 2010. Accessed September 25, 2013.www.exberliner.com/articles/the-trickery-of-the-truth-teller. - Löfgren, Mikael. “’Apatiska för nybörjare’ på Folkteatern”. Review of Apatiska för nybörjare, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Dagens Nyheter, September 19, 2011. Accessed September 19, 2013. http://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/scenrecensioner/ apatiska-for-nyborjare-pa- - folkteatern/. Monson, Ander. “Untamable Tongue”. New York Times, February 25, 2011. Accessed April 25, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/books/review/ Monson-t.html?pagewanted =all&_r=0. - Nyberg, Per. ”Explosions in Stockholm believed to be failed terrorist attack”. CNN, December 12, 2010. Accessed September 2, 2013. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/ WORLD/europe/12/11/sweden.explosion/index.html?hpt=T1. - Nykvist, Karin. ”Mörkrets alla nyanser”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Sydsvenskan, October 16, 2012. http://www. sydsvenskan.se/Pages/ArticlePage.aspx?id=667633&epslanguage=sv. - Pannacci, Giovanni. “Intervista a Jonas Hassen Khemiri”. Mangialibri, March 15, 2010. Accessed February 20, 2013. http://www.mangialibri.com/node/6012. - Ravini, Sinziana. ”Jonas Hassen Khemiri / Jag ringer mina bröder”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Göteborgs- Posten, October 16, 2012. http://www.gp.se/kulturnoje/litteratur/1.1097163-jonas-hassen-khemiri- jag-ringer-mina-broder. - Ring, Lars. “Hela ensemblen lyser i viktig politisk pjäs”. Review of Apatiska för nybörjare, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Svenska Dagbladet, Feburary 17, 2013. Accessed September 19, 2013. http://www.svd.se/kultur/scen/hela-ensemblenlyser-i-viktig-politisk-pjas_7921872.svd. - Sears, Neil and Nick Fagge. “Portray of a happy family”. Daily Mail, December 13, 2010. Accessed August 2, 2013. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article1339011/Stockholm-suicide-bomber-family-portrait-wife-parents.html. 159 - Stålhberg, Carin. ”Jag skriver för att hitta nyanserna”. DN, October 10, 2012. Accessed, 20, 2013. http://www.dn.se/dnbok/dnbok-hem/jag-skriver-for-att- hitta-nyanserna. - Wahlin, Claes. ”Om utanförskap inifrån”. Review of Jag ringer mina bröder, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Aftonbladet, October 16, 2012. http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/bokrecensioner/article15625805.ab. - Weiss, Hedy. “’Invasion!’ arrives at divisive time in the world”. Review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. Chicago Sun-Times, August 6, 2011. Accessed September 19, 2013. http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/stage/ 21687599-421/invasion-arrives-at-worlds-divisive-time.html. - Zinoman, Jason. “A Slip of the Tongue Could Lead to Terror”. Review of Invasion!, by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. New York Times, February 23, 2011. 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