Women in the Works of Ghassan Kanafani: A Comparative Reading of Two Novels

This article surveys Ghassan Kanafani’s fictions, arguing that his literature of resistance features militant men or ordinary coping with the consequences dislocation. Hence, presence women is mainly subordinate. Then investigates ambivalent in two novellas diverging from mainstream texts which marginalize women, offering instead prevailing female figures: All That’s Left to You (1966) and Umm Saad (1969). In former, Maryam loses her honor, getting pregnant out wedlock just as people lose Jaffa; fallen woman allegorically becomes lost nation, thus assumes negative attributes mother archetype. latter, this ancillary changes titular heroine enacts attachment land. positive archetype, figuratively becoming fertile land be regained. Using a relevant framework on archetypal criticism feminine, shows close association between Palestinian (the ideals liberty fertility well meanings loss/disgrace). Such ambivalence can understood range aspects Appealing recurring patterns primordial human psyche, Kanafani asserts universalism committed fiction, right regain basic need, richness archetype collective unconscious nation. problematizes traditional gender roles fiction.