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Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art
A timely and urgent inquiry by one of global literature's leading lights
In this concisely argued and illuminating book, the PEN/Faulkner Award–winning author Rabih Alameddine takes the subject of politics and art head-on, questioning the very premise of dividing these two pillars of culture into an either/or proposition. He reveals how a political dimension enlarges a work of art rather than making it less beautiful or reducing it to a polemic, as we are so often and carelessly taught. But he also ponders what makes art political to begin how essential is the artist’s conscious political intent, and what does the reader or viewer contribute to the work’s political capability or significance? In exploring these questions, Alameddine engages intensely with his role as an immigrant and a gay author writing inside a globally dominant, often oblivious culture, and invokes the work of numerous writers, from Tayeb Salih and Aleksandar Hemon to Teju Cole and Salman Rushdie, who also struggle to be heard as something more than an “other.” The book features throughout Alameddine’s brilliantly relatable voice—shrewd, humorous, challenging, and as honest about his own limitations as he is about his passions.
In this concisely argued and illuminating book, the PEN/Faulkner Award–winning author Rabih Alameddine takes the subject of politics and art head-on, questioning the very premise of dividing these two pillars of culture into an either/or proposition. He reveals how a political dimension enlarges a work of art rather than making it less beautiful or reducing it to a polemic, as we are so often and carelessly taught. But he also ponders what makes art political to begin how essential is the artist’s conscious political intent, and what does the reader or viewer contribute to the work’s political capability or significance? In exploring these questions, Alameddine engages intensely with his role as an immigrant and a gay author writing inside a globally dominant, often oblivious culture, and invokes the work of numerous writers, from Tayeb Salih and Aleksandar Hemon to Teju Cole and Salman Rushdie, who also struggle to be heard as something more than an “other.” The book features throughout Alameddine’s brilliantly relatable voice—shrewd, humorous, challenging, and as honest about his own limitations as he is about his passions.
93 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 22, 2024
3 people are currently reading
148 people want to read
About the author
Rabih Alameddine
26 books977 followersRabih Alameddine (Arabic: ربيع علم الدين; born 1959) is an American painter and writer. His 2021 novel The Wrong End of the Telescope won the 2022 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.
Alameddine was born in Amman, Jordan to Lebanese Druze parents. He grew up in Kuwait and Lebanon, which he left at age 17 to live first in England and then in California to pursue higher education. He earned a degree in engineering from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Business in San Francisco.
Alameddine began his career as an engineer, then moved to writing and painting. His debut novel Koolaids, which touched on both the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco and the Lebanese Civil War, was published in 1998 by Picador.
The author of six novels and a collection of short stories, Alameddine was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2002. His queer sensibility has added a different slant to narratives about immigrants within the context of what became known as Orientalism.
In 2014, Alameddine was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and he won the California Book Awards Gold Medal Fiction for An Unnecessary Woman.
Alameddine is best known for this novel, which tells the story of Aaliya, a Lebanese woman and translator living in war-torn Lebanon. The novel "manifests traumatic signposts of the [Lebanese] civil war, which make it indelibly situational, and accordingly latches onto complex psychological issues."
In 2017, Alameddine won the Arab American Book Award and the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Fiction for The Angel of History.
In 2018 he was teaching in the University of Virginia's creative writing program, in Charlottesville.
He was shortlisted for the 2021 Sunday Times Short Story Award for his story, "The July War".
His novel The Wrong End of the Telescope won the 2022 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.
Alameddine was born in Amman, Jordan to Lebanese Druze parents. He grew up in Kuwait and Lebanon, which he left at age 17 to live first in England and then in California to pursue higher education. He earned a degree in engineering from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Business in San Francisco.
Alameddine began his career as an engineer, then moved to writing and painting. His debut novel Koolaids, which touched on both the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco and the Lebanese Civil War, was published in 1998 by Picador.
The author of six novels and a collection of short stories, Alameddine was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2002. His queer sensibility has added a different slant to narratives about immigrants within the context of what became known as Orientalism.
In 2014, Alameddine was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and he won the California Book Awards Gold Medal Fiction for An Unnecessary Woman.
Alameddine is best known for this novel, which tells the story of Aaliya, a Lebanese woman and translator living in war-torn Lebanon. The novel "manifests traumatic signposts of the [Lebanese] civil war, which make it indelibly situational, and accordingly latches onto complex psychological issues."
In 2017, Alameddine won the Arab American Book Award and the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Fiction for The Angel of History.
In 2018 he was teaching in the University of Virginia's creative writing program, in Charlottesville.
He was shortlisted for the 2021 Sunday Times Short Story Award for his story, "The July War".
His novel The Wrong End of the Telescope won the 2022 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
July 23, 2025
If you pride yourself on (so-called?) diversity in your reading, you need to consume these two essays by Rabih Alameddine!
You'll be asking yourself: Why is it that political books are understood to be "bad literature"? Why do we praise novels written by "foreign" Western authors for building a non-intimidating bridge to (insert non-European ethnicity here)? Why is John Updike such a dick in his book reviews?
All great ideas for further contemplation, and examined in under 100 pages. Go now! As Bigolas Dickolas Wolfwood famously tweeted: "do it right now I'm very extremely serious."
You'll be asking yourself: Why is it that political books are understood to be "bad literature"? Why do we praise novels written by "foreign" Western authors for building a non-intimidating bridge to (insert non-European ethnicity here)? Why is John Updike such a dick in his book reviews?
All great ideas for further contemplation, and examined in under 100 pages. Go now! As Bigolas Dickolas Wolfwood famously tweeted: "do it right now I'm very extremely serious."
February 3, 2025
if you’re familiar with alameddine’s fiction already, you likely need no convincing to read this. i haven’t read any of his fiction yet but have added it all to my list after reading this. some people just have an absolutely brilliant way with words, and he is one of them.
COMFORTING MYTHS: CONCERNING THE POLITICAL IN ART is hilarious and scathing at once, a blend of tones that is incredibly rare — but i wish it wasn’t.
the word “political” itself has morphed and evolved (or devolved, perhaps) and doesn’t mean the same thing to all people. alameddine’s discussion of the way the word itself has changed, as well as the way it is used as an adjective (specifically to describe art and literature) is spot on.
he goes into an incredibly thoughtful analysis on what makes something political or not. most people think that something is political if the creator intended it to be. alameddine makes a compelling argument that perhaps intent isn’t so consequential. if it is received as political by the interpretation of the person(s) consuming the art, then is that actually ultimately what defines it?
he also engages in a strong critical analysis of how identity politics has become more emphasized as important/valuable in the literature world, and this has led to a mentality that representation is the be-all and end-all. but who we accept as allowed to represent various groups is in itself extremely limiting. consider which marginalized voices are allowed into the mainstream fold, and which are not, and how that in itself is very much by design. as an analogy: if you only hear from local tour guides, but not from any other locals, what are you missing?
i honestly cannot recommend this book enough. in less than 100 pages, it somehow conveys a world.
COMFORTING MYTHS: CONCERNING THE POLITICAL IN ART is hilarious and scathing at once, a blend of tones that is incredibly rare — but i wish it wasn’t.
the word “political” itself has morphed and evolved (or devolved, perhaps) and doesn’t mean the same thing to all people. alameddine’s discussion of the way the word itself has changed, as well as the way it is used as an adjective (specifically to describe art and literature) is spot on.
he goes into an incredibly thoughtful analysis on what makes something political or not. most people think that something is political if the creator intended it to be. alameddine makes a compelling argument that perhaps intent isn’t so consequential. if it is received as political by the interpretation of the person(s) consuming the art, then is that actually ultimately what defines it?
he also engages in a strong critical analysis of how identity politics has become more emphasized as important/valuable in the literature world, and this has led to a mentality that representation is the be-all and end-all. but who we accept as allowed to represent various groups is in itself extremely limiting. consider which marginalized voices are allowed into the mainstream fold, and which are not, and how that in itself is very much by design. as an analogy: if you only hear from local tour guides, but not from any other locals, what are you missing?
i honestly cannot recommend this book enough. in less than 100 pages, it somehow conveys a world.
December 31, 2024
Goddess, how I love Rabih Alameddine. I finished this in less than an hour, and I will read it again later on today, and again and again and again in the next year, and however many we get beyond that. “Writing about the human condition is a political act; in fact, it might be one of the greatest political acts.” Every word he writes is pure white hot truth. What a great way to end 2024.
July 24, 2025
This collection of two essays by Alameddine and accompanying afterword hover around the central theme that most writing is (or can be) political, and that’s not a bad thing.
In the first essay, Alameddine walks through the various factors that can make writing political, ranging from novels on non-war topics during times of active conflict to the race of narrators in famous stories, and the audience reception to these pieces. Not talking about politics is only beneficial to those who wish to remain in charge; telling authors to stay in their lane or praising work because it appears apolitical not only limits the art, but is detrimental to the whole. We as readers need to divorce ourselves from the mentality that just because a book has political themes means it’s not good.
In the second piece, Alameddine digs into this concept of the dominant culture defining what is political (particularly when it comes to writing, as in novels), and that most authors who are “allowed to talk” hold a gilded mirror up to this dominant culture. There’s a section that posits Western writers with non-American backgrounds are “purveyors of comforting myths”, a pre-digested tour guide for an audience who views them as “other” but just familiar *enough* — for both a political and cultural lens to their perceived home culture.
Together these essays are a digestible look at politics in literature and uncomfortable truths. While I’m not sure I totally “got it”, reading this collection was an exercise in pushing myself outside of my usual comfort zone & encouraged me to start thinking a bit more critically about what is (and isn’t) published in mainstream media and why.
In the first essay, Alameddine walks through the various factors that can make writing political, ranging from novels on non-war topics during times of active conflict to the race of narrators in famous stories, and the audience reception to these pieces. Not talking about politics is only beneficial to those who wish to remain in charge; telling authors to stay in their lane or praising work because it appears apolitical not only limits the art, but is detrimental to the whole. We as readers need to divorce ourselves from the mentality that just because a book has political themes means it’s not good.
In the second piece, Alameddine digs into this concept of the dominant culture defining what is political (particularly when it comes to writing, as in novels), and that most authors who are “allowed to talk” hold a gilded mirror up to this dominant culture. There’s a section that posits Western writers with non-American backgrounds are “purveyors of comforting myths”, a pre-digested tour guide for an audience who views them as “other” but just familiar *enough* — for both a political and cultural lens to their perceived home culture.
Together these essays are a digestible look at politics in literature and uncomfortable truths. While I’m not sure I totally “got it”, reading this collection was an exercise in pushing myself outside of my usual comfort zone & encouraged me to start thinking a bit more critically about what is (and isn’t) published in mainstream media and why.
March 18, 2025
As someone familiar with #RabihAlameddine’s writing, I needed no convincing to read his first nonfiction book. The man has a brilliant way with words and a unique style that is smart, funny and severely critical, reeling you in from the get go.
In #ComfortingMyths he analyses what makes literature political or not, intent or interpretation? And if writing about the human condition is the only subject a literary writer should deal with, he says, “Writing about the human condition is a political act; in fact, it might be one of the greatest political acts”.
In #ComfortingMyths he analyses what makes literature political or not, intent or interpretation? And if writing about the human condition is the only subject a literary writer should deal with, he says, “Writing about the human condition is a political act; in fact, it might be one of the greatest political acts”.
September 20, 2025
Alameddine is absurdly likeable, and absurdly easy to read, and well, just plain funny, and it felt like I had barely picked up this empassioned couple of essays on why all stories are political before it was done and I was sad there wasn't more of it.
April 26, 2025
5 stars for the person who says american pastoral is identity politics.
April 27, 2025
one million stars, essential reading, etc
May 31, 2025
Punches way above its 82-page weight class. Read it in a single sitting but walk away with the learnings, discussions, and laughs of a full college lit course.
November 28, 2025
an easy, enjoyable published essay
October 4, 2025
This is a really great little book. I'm still kinda shocked by the things the author's friends had to say about some books though... like... that's crazy
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews