Saud Alsanousi | Autor | LibraryThing

Mama Hissa's Mice: A Novel von Saud Alsanousi

This is a book of many parts: an imagined near future where Kuwait has been torn apart by sectarian violence, flashbacks to the narrator Katkout's childhood in the 90s, all interspersed with excerpts from a novel that Katkout is on the verge of publishing.

Mama Hissa's Mice is one of those instances where I'm fully prepared to admit that it may not be the book, that it's me who is at fault here. I simply lack the familiarity with either Kuwaiti or Arab culture or history to understand a lot of necessary context, and this may be a novel that works better for those with more knowledge. But that cultural opacity, coupled with a large cast of characters that I struggled to tell apart, some weird treatment of the women characters (an awful lot of them seem to have Very Symbolic bouts of illness: blindness, cancer, miscarriages, timely deaths), and the lumpen pacing that resulted from the shifting back and forth between the novel and the novel-within-a-novel, meant that I bounced off this book pretty hard.

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siriaeve | 1 weitere Rezension | Jun 26, 2022 |

Mama Hissa's Mice: A Novel von Saud Alsanousi

I read about 20% of this book before deciding that life's too short to struggle with books I'm finding difficult. While I quite liked the story and characters, particularly Mama Hissa and her sense of humour, I don't know, or want to know, too much about the subject matter. If you manage to finish it, you're a braver wo/man than me.

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earthsinger | 1 weitere Rezension | Mar 16, 2021 |

Saq Al-bambu Bamboo Stalk Sak Albambou

"لو كنت مثل نبتة البامبو.. لا انتماء لها.. نقتطع جزءاً من ساقها.. نغرسه، بلا جذور، في أي أرض.. لا يلبث الساق طويلاً حتى تنبت له جذور جديدة.. تنمو من جديد.. في أرض جديدة.. بلا ماض.. بلا ذاكرة.. لا يلتفت إلى اختلاف الناس حول تسميته.. كاوايان في الفلبين.. خيزران في الكويت.. أو بامبو في أماكن أخرى"
كنت أظن أن تلك اللذة التي دفعتني لعدم لترك رواية العيب ليوسف إدريس قبل أن أنهيها في جلسة واحدة لن تتكرر مع أي كتاب آخر ؛ ولكن هاهي تكررت بشكل غير معقول وبلذة مضاعفة تجعلني أود إعادة البدء في قرائتها من جديد

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Mariam_AbdAllah | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Feb 3, 2020 |

ساق البامبو von سعود السنعوسي

العطاء من دون حب لا قيمة له
الأخذ من دون امتنان لا طعم له

رواية رائعة حية المشاهد والأحاسيس

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Maaly_Ahmed | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Aug 23, 2019 |

The Bamboo Stalk (Large Print Edition) von Saud Alsanousi

"The decision wasn't your father's. A whole society stood behind him"
By sally tarbox on 27 April 2017
Format: Audible Audio Edition
Read as part of a round-the-world challenge, this Kuwaiti novel was quite compelling, following the plight of Filipino immigrant workers in Kuwait.
Narrator Jose/ Isa (his Filipino and Kuwaiti names) is the child of a poor Filipino maid by the son of the wealthy family she works for. Pressure from his scandalized grandmother means the maid is sent back home with her child ... but always the vague promise that he can return one day when the time is right.
Brought up in poverty, with a horrible grandfather and prostitute aunt, Jose never quite knows who he is. "I was more like a bamboo plant, which doesn't belong anywhere in particular. You can cut off a piece of the stalk and plant it without roots in any piece of ground...the stalk sprouts new roots and starts to grow again in thew new ground with no past, no memory."
His mother doesn't press Catholicism on him, convinced he'll become a muslim one day. And then one day he gets to visit his father's homeland...
A sad tale which brings out the prejudice and snobbishness of a supposedly religious country.
Not the greatest literature, but quite a good read.½

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starbox | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Apr 27, 2017 |

The Bamboo Stalk von Saud Alsanousi

An excellent insight into life in Kuwait and The Philippines.

I've just finished this and I was pretty impressed by the way the author managed to show the full extent of Jose's position as a Philippino/Kuwaiti, both in the Philippines and in Kuwait. I was also surprised to find that this is in fact a translation from Arabic, so full marks to Jonathan Wright, the translator.

Jose's mother, Josephine, was a Philippina maid in the Al-Tarouf household in Kuwait, when she fell in love with Rashid, the wayward, only son. Rashid loved his baby son but his mother was horrified and turned him out of the house. Not surprisingly, Josephine lost her job and she and her son were deported back home.
There is no news from Rashid for many years and Josephine's searches come back cold. But although Jose is raised in the Philippines, he always carries his father's promise that he will eventually return to be a son of Kuwait.

The book description reveals that he does manage to return to Kuwait, as a young man, so I'm not giving away any spoilers there. What he finds though, is probably the book's strongest part - it shows how the people are not primarily Kuwaiti, nor from a particular sect or class, their strongest allegiance is to the family name and it is pride in this that rules all their actions. Nothing must bring shame on the family, and a half Philippino son is not something to be proud of.

I can see why The Bamboo Stalk was winner of the 2013 International Prize for Arab Fiction - chosen both for its literary qualities and for “its social and humanitarian content.”
It is an excellent insight into the issues behind the phenomenon of expat workers into wealthy GCC countries.
Definitely recommended.

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DubaiReader | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Aug 29, 2016 |

The Bamboo Stalk von Saud Alsanousi

ساق البامبو” للكاتب سعود السنعوسي ليست رواية رائعة فحسب، بل رسالة لنبذ العنصرية، دعوة لاحترام الإنسان والمكان، وطنًا كان أم عنوانًا،
ساق البامبو رواية تعالج قضية إجتماعية إنسانية تبحث عن حقوق أبناء لم يجرموا سواء أن القدر أنجبهم والأرض لم تستوعب وجودهم عليها
حيث الأب الخليجي والأم الفلبينية!!قضية تكثر وبشدة في الدول الخليجية
ويبقى الأبناء ضحية هذه النزوات!
ليست عملاً روائيًّا فحسب، بل تجاوزته لتأخذ القارئ إلى رحلة البحث عن الهوية، واكتشاف الذات، والرغبة بالانتماء.
في عمله الروائي “ساق البامبو” استطاع سعود السنعوسي أن يتحدى القلم، وأن يجذب الفكرة إلى أرض الواقع. لكنها تجاوزته لهز حائط العادات والتقاليد في المجتمع الخليجي
ملقيًا بعشرات الأسئلة في فضاء الواقع المرير؛ لعلها تجد طريقها نحو المكاشفة والإنصاف.

تمتاز هذه الرواية ببساطة اللغة وتناسق العبارات وتكامل المفردات لينسج كل ذاك لغة واضحة بسيطة
الكاتب تناول قضيته بكل طلاقة و أريحية وسلاسة
هي رواية إصلاحية إستنهاضية للأمه علها تفيق!!!!½

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faith93 | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Dec 24, 2014 |

Saq Al-bambu Bamboo Stalk Sak Albambou

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dinanabil | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Feb 28, 2014 |

Saq Al-bambu Bamboo Stalk Sak Albambou

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Dina_Nabil | 6 weitere Rezensionen | Feb 28, 2014 |

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