Men in the Sun and Other Palestinian Stories

by Ghassan Kanafani

This collection of important stories by novelist, journalist, teacher, and Palestinian activist Ghassan Kanafani includes the stunning novella Men in the Sun (1962), the basis of the film The Deceived. In the unsparing clarity of his writing, Kanafani offers the reader a gritty look at the agonized world of Palestine and the adjoining Middle East.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Classics, Middle East, Historical Fiction, Politics, Literature

90 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Ghassan Kanafani (Arabic: غسان كنفاني‎‎)

Ghassan Kanafani was a Palestinian journalist, fiction writer, and a spokesman for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Kanafani died at the age of 36, assassinated by car bomb in Beirut, By the Israeli Mossad

Ghassan Fayiz Kanafani was born in Acre in Palestine (then under the British mandate) in 1936. His father was a lawyer, and sent Ghassan to a French missionary school in Jaffa. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Kanafani and his family fled to Lebanon, but soon moved on to Damascus, Syria, to live there as Palestinian refugees.

After studying Arabic literature at the University of Damascus, Kanafani became a teacher at the Palestinian refugee camps in Syria. There, he began writing short stories, influenced by his contact with young children and their experiences as stateless citizens.
In 1960 he moved to Beirut, Lebanon, where he became the editor of several newspapers, all with an Arab nationalist affiliation. In Beirut, he published the novel Men in the Sun (1962). He also published extensively on literature and politics, focusing on the the Palestinian liberation movement and the refugee experience, as well as engaging in scholarly literary criticism, publishing several books about post-1948 Palestinian and Israeli literature.

Reviews

[Murray · Rating 5 out of 5]

☀️☀️ Here is a volume that exhibits the power of words and story to tell what media and op-eds and talking heads cannot. Many of the stories were bewildering and disturbing because they showed me worlds I did not know and wished did not exist. Anger and outrage crackle on every page. The writing is strong and vivid.

☀️I always try to read the stories from all cultures and situations, they are far more critical to embrace than textbooks or media (which have their place) in comprehending the diversity of our world with all its tensions and conflicts and strivings for justice.

☀️☀️ I also highly recommend his collection of shorts, Palestine’s Children. It’s an equally powerful and significant work about the Palestinian world. I have reviewed it as well and quite extensively. I do a brief piece on every one of the stories.

[Suad Shamma · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've had this page open all day, and I still don't know how to start.

I don't know what to say about this book that hasn't already been said. I don't how to describe this book in ways different than the ways it's already been described.

This book is personal to me, so very personal, because I am a Palestinian, born and raised in the United Arab Emirates. I am a Palestinian, who only stepped foot in Palestine only once in my life - a year ago. I am a Palestinian, who was born to Palestinian parents, who have never been to Palestine. I am a Palestinian, whose grandparents fled Palestine in 1948 - the year of the Nakba. In fact, my mother's family lived and grew up in Kuwait. So, Men in the Sun, specifically, was a story that touched me deeply. It was a story that broke my heart, because I may have found a home away from home, but many others haven't. Men in the Sun clearly and bluntly describes that horrible journey that many people have taken or attempted to take in their efforts to try and find a better life for them and their families.

This was my first Ghassan Kanafani read, and I was told that it would hurt to read this, and it did. The brilliance of Kanafani's work is that it never points a finger at one particular villain. It's implied, but it's never spoken plainly. Instead, he shows you different aspects of the struggle that Palestinians go through. Struggles that they've experienced, and still experience, in the Arab world. He shows you - probably from his own personal experience - how other Arabs treat Palestinians.

Of all the stories, Men in the Sun hurt the most. The ending was brutal and it hits you so hard. You know things aren't going to end well, but it still jolts you to see HOW and WHY things end the way they do. The silliness of the entire situation, the absolute ridiculousness of men, their conversations, their play at authority and power. The irony of how one man's literal emasculation is actually the reason that a delay occurs at the border crossing, which becomes the reason for the demise of three men. You cannot be sure how to feel about this man, whether to blame him or not, as he seems genuinely saddened, but at the same time, his only concern is money and does not shy away from stealing their possessions after their deaths.

The last paragraph in which he asks a question that we all thought to ask was probably the most powerful, "The thought slipped from his mind and ran onto his tongue: "Why didn't they knock on the sides of the tank?" He turned right round once, but he was afraid he would fall, so he climbed into his seat and leaned his head on the wheel. "Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you say anything? Why? - The desert suddenly began to send back the echo: "Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why? Why? Why?"

The other stories are just as powerful, and talk about refugees who have already left Palestine and how that has impacted them. The last story is the only one different from the rest. While all stories talk about Palestinians leaving Palestine, A Letter From Gaza tells the story of a young man who returns to Gaza to visit his family, but then decides to stay there and not go back to Kuwait where he has a job that could lead him to California, the land of freedom and opportunity. It is written in the form of a letter to a friend, as he tells him that he has decided not to meet him in Sacramento after all. That he has decided to remain in Gaza with his family, that his true place is there, at home.

Beautifully written, beautiful story-telling, this book is a must-read and a reminder to all Palestinians that we should not stop knocking on the sides of the tank. That we should continue to make noise. To not forget.

[Lilyya ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

"لماذا لم يدقوا جدران الخزان؟"

رواية عن رجل، شاب و عجوز مطرودين من بيتهم —فلسطين— طالبين لقمة و قاصدين قوت العيش عند ابواب جيرانهم —الكويت—

من ابشع و اجمل ما قيل في هذه القصة ممثلة لقباحة واقع يكرر نفسه منذ سنين و أجيال:

‏"أنا مبسوط ‏إنك ستذهب إلى الكويت لأنك ستتعلم هناك أشياء عديدة… ‏أول شي تتعلمه هو أن القرش يأتي أولا ثم الاخلاق"

"‏-طيب، أنا لا أعرف كيف أصلي..
-لا تعرف؟
زأر الجميع فأكد الاستاذ
-لا اعرف.
‏-و ماذا تعرف إذا
-أشياء كثيرة.. انني اجيد اطلاق الرصاص مثلا…
‏وصل للباب ‏فالتفت، كان وجهه النحيف يرتجف:
-إذا ‏هاجموكم أيقظوني، قد اكون ذا نفعا.."

"-ها، الامر لا يحتاج الى ذكاء خارق، كلهم يكفون عن ارسال ‏النقود إلى عائلاتهم ‏حين يتزوجون او يعشقون…
‏ ‏أحس مروان بخيبة أمل صغيرة تنمو في صدره، ‏لا لانه فوجئ ‏بل لانه اكتشف أن الأمر شائع و معروف ، ‏لقد كان يحسب أنه يخنق صدره على سرّ كبير لا يعرفه غيره.."


_________________________________



I haven’t read in Arabic in ages so I’m excited to get the full experience with this read, it might take me a bit longer to finish it, tho😭

[Bayan Haddad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read Men in the Sun when I was in the sixth grade and couldn't comprehend the story without the help of the teacher. I felt I was reading something important but couldn't tell how and why.
Now that I've read it again, things have become clearer. Feelings of disappointment, anger, resistance, and tragedy spring up while reading. It's not merely a story of three men die while their smuggler gets trapped in a silly chat with a border officer. It's an embodiment of the Palestinian situation after the 1948 catastrophe. The refugee problem, lethargy on the part of Palestinians and lack of resistance and awareness among Arabs and their share of complicity, absence of hope and love, bureaucracy, the existence of borders in the Arab world .. a combination of these is found in this novella and can still be found nowadays. Unfortunately.
I often wonder what Ghassan Kanafani's stance would be was he alive. Would he still go for armend resistance? I don't know but what I know is that Ghassan had a great vision and he visualized it in his masterpieces. Ghassan trusted his reader's wits & conscience. He was about to be a spokesman of a collective vision but then his enemies felt the threat and assassinated him & his niece.
I think we still should bang the walls of the tank,make noise and let the world hear our voice in every possible way. Ghassan's message got received!
His short stories are no less great! "The Land of Sand Oranges" is about reliving the Nakbah and its immediate aftermath while 'If You Were a Horse' and "A Hand in the Grave" talk about myths, superstitions, and self-made conceptions and the way we interact with them and sometimes let them destroy our lives. "The Falcon" is so beautifully written and is about a Bedouin who's likened to a falcon. "Letter from Gaza" is my favorite- the sense of responsibility and initiative to build our country and live in it for better or worse is presented in a touching way.
All in all, read the book please!

[S · Rating 5 out of 5]

"𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘰𝘥 𝘸𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘪𝘯 𝘗𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘭𝘦𝘧𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘵𝘰𝘰, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘳𝘦𝘧𝘶𝘨𝘦𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘐 𝘥𝘪𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸..."

I read this collection last year, not able to fully grasp the size of the Palestinian tragedy. This year, with Palestine returning to the global spotlight in May, I read more about the country and felt I needed to read this collection again, now with much better understanding.

I thorougly enjoyed all seven of its stories, Kanafani's writing surpassed all my expectations, and I was impressed by how powerfully his writing is rooted in Palestinian history, culture and folklore. He truly was one of the greatest Palestinian authors.

[Emmkay · Rating 5 out of 5]

A slim but very powerful collection of stories written in the 1950s and 60s. The first, titular story (novella?) is the longest, a harrowing tale of three Palestinian men in Basra throwing in their lot with a fourth who offers to take them to their desired destination in Kuwait, where work is said to await. I could scarcely lift my eyes from the page, but when I did, I thought about the fact that, despite being written decades ago, it continues to speak directly to what so many migrants and displaced people experience.

The other stories are brief, and some more effective than others, but all worthwhile. Among them, I was especially moved by “The Land of Sad Oranges” portrays a child’s experience of displacement, as his family leaves their orange trees behind for new lives as refugees, his father entering a new life in angry despair. The final “Letter from Gaza,” written in 1956, takes on an added poignancy today, as a man writes to a friend in California to explain why he cannot bring himself to leave Gaza to join him, and implores his friend to return. In the past, he wondered, “What is this ill-defined tie we had with Gaza that blunted our enthusiasm for flight? Why didn’t we analyze the matter in such a way as to give it a clear meaning? Why didn’t we leave the defeat with its wounds behind us and move on to a brighter future that would give us deeper consolation? Why? We didn’t exactly know.” Then his thoughts become clearer after an encounter with a young relative who has been injured in a bombing.

[Sahar · Rating 4 out of 5]

“God was certainly good to you when he made you die one night before the wretched village fell into the hands of the Jews. One night only. O God, is there any divine favor greater than that?”

Tracing the grim voyage of three Palestinian men who left a refugee camp to seek work in Kuwait to help their families, Men in the Sun is a poignant, melancholic exploration of the Palestinian refugee experience. Set in Basra, the story flits between past and present, the bittersweet memories of the life in the refugee camp interrupting the illegal south-bound expedition across the scorching desert.

“Kuwait is over there, that place that hadn’t lived in his mind except as a dream, it had to be something that existed materially, of stone and dust and water and sky…”

Of the novella and six short stories that constitute this work, the novella, Men in the Sun, was the most powerful and memorable. Though a translated work, Kanafani’s profound, symbolic prose and creative use of literary devices made each story a captivating read. Though written from the perspective of the individual protagonists, the narrative has an acute focus on the collective. By the end of the novella, the miles traversed are rendered all but redundant.

The Land of Sad Oranges was another deeply moving story in this collection. The narrator initially does not understand the significance of leaving Yaffa for Akka—he was just a child—however, he is eventually confronted by the reality of exile and newfound refugee status.

“You were huddled there, as far from your childhood as you were from the land of oranges—the oranges that, according to a peasant who used to cultivate them until he left, would shrivel up if a change occurred and they were watered by a strange hand.”

On this day, we remember Ghassan Kanafani as the martyr who wrote about martyrs, as the revolutionary whose legacy lives on through his profound works and inspires us to, as pleaded by the lorry driver in Men in the Sun, knock on the tank.

4/5

[Andrew]

The aura around Kanafani – the brilliant Palestinian writer murdered by Mossad for nebulous reasons – seems to get more press than Kanafani’s writing itself, which is a shame. While that lore has a greater allure, what Men in the Sun really entails is the ugly, muddy realities of things. The men trying to migrate their way to Kuwait aren’t particularly remarkable. They’re trying to get by. There used to be a lot of novels like this in the decolonizing decades, but they’ve become rarer. Granted, some of them were little more than agit-prop, but I liked this in its simplicity and brutality.

[Dania · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cried at the last story. It was very easy to relate to at the current point in my life where I am decided what, if anything, I owe this country. And I am trying to measure that up with the desire for an easier safer life with its own set of difficulties, most of which will be spiritual and not physical.

Overall it was a cohesive collection that breathed life into different lives, forcing the reader to feel and understand what is already difficult to communicate. Nobody wants to have to explain their trauma, but this Kanafani did a great job explaining the immense hopelessness.

This remind me of an article (attached below) I read that PTSD is a western concept. It said “We describe our psychological experience in terms that we hope to be understood in the West, so we talk a lot about PTSD,” she says. “But I see patients with PTSD after a car accident. Not after imprisonment, not after bombardment or being labeled as a person against the law and having a relationship with prison like revolving door. The effect is more profound. It changes the personality, it changes the belief system, and it doesn’t look like PTSD.”

https://qz.com/1521806/palestines-hea...

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

In my first exposure to Ghassan Kanafani, I read both Men In The Sun and Palestine’s Children back to back, and this review covers both. The introductory essays in these works emphasized the non-deterministic outlook of Kanafani that was so important to his political vision. Such an outlook arguably goes against a culture that is heavily influenced by the idea of a pre-determined destiny lifted from a particular interpretation of the God described in the Qur’an. Kanafani (and I) would argue that any sort of divine knowledge of destiny needs to be set aside for the truth that we still have free will, responsibility, and a choice at every step. There is a natural law that permeates existence – a law of justice – that requires action to fully implement. Kanafani’s perspective comes from that of the Marxist revolutionary, but no matter the perspective, the underlying essence of the law is universally the same.

The freedom to choose does however carry with it a form of destiny in the sense that we choose particular unknown consequences with every decision. Some of these consequences will be known, for example in the choice between choosing to become a revolutionary and leave a family versus choosing to focus on daily subsistence – an idea that takes shape in Men in the Sun. Other consequences will only be known over time, and this idea is articulated most fully in Returning to Haifa, in the transformation of Khaldun from Arab to Jew.

We can see a familiar progression in Kanafani’s writing and political awareness from the large scale cause in Men in the Sun to the experienced exile in Returning to Haifa. Through the transformation of Khaldun in the latter, Kanafani looks at some of the most basic questions of what it means to be human and how we choose our sense of belonging. What is a human? Is it simply a “cause” and culturally conditioned identity as Khaldun and Said would seem to allude? Or is there something transcendent that is identifiable via the soul or the heart over and above any mental or physical form of identification? Certainly there are universal human traits that we all share, and it was in Mariam’s recognition of the dead Arab child tossed onto the truck “like a piece of wood” that most powerfully articulated this idea. Mariam, a Jew, saw her brother being killed by the Nazis in this dead Arab child, and Kanafani’s choice of “moderate” Jews in Mariam and Iphrat furthered this universal human ideal. We all suffer, and Kanafani’s evolved political awareness in 1969 was able to convey this through the brilliant choice of characters in Returning to Haifa.

These two books should be read together to fully appreciate the evolution of Kanafani’s political consciousness. Kanafani saw politics and the novel as united: “In my novels I express reality, as I understand it, without analysis”.

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kanafani was a promising Palestinian novelist who did that ultimate no-no (especially in the Middle East!) and got mixed up in politics. Thus, he and his teen aged niece got blown up when he started his car, courtesy of the Mossad.
It's never easy nor even desirable to separate one's politics from one's writings. Indeed, if you're a Palestinian or Israeli, it's probably virtually impossible (Meir Shalev a notable exception), but you can read Kanafani without knowing any of that crap.
"Men in the Sun" was quite famous in Arab literature, still is, I suppose. Three Palestinian dudes hide in a truck to get themselves smuggled into Kuwait for work and money for their families. I'll leave it at that. It's harrowing. In fact, part of Kanafani's gift was to make banal the background of his characters and steep them in more immediate hells. He also has quite the knack for shifting between persons, so that characters melt into each other so much that you realize half a page down that you're actually reading about someone else.
Various shorter works make up the rest of the collection. Good stuff, and a bit off the beaten path of the usual Arab writers.

[Carey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This short story collection offers a deeply affecting and necessary window into the Palestinian experience, told through stories that are unflinching, intimate, and politically layered. Kanafani’s brilliance lies not just in what he writes, but in what he chooses not to spell out. There is no overt naming of villains, no sensationalized depiction of violence. Instead, the weight of displacement, grief, and alienation is carried in the spaces between lines — through gesture and dialogue.

The stories do not aim to universalize the Palestinian condition, nor do they center the perspectives of those outside it. Even when other Arabs appear in these narratives, it is not to diversify the viewpoint but to illustrate the indifference, or even hostility, with which Palestinians are often treated in exile. These encounters, though quietly written, underscore the loneliness of dispossession. The focus never strays from the Palestinian subject; their pain, resistance, and resilience are the heart of every piece. Villains exist here, yes, but Kanafani refuses to give them a voice or platform. This is a deliberate and powerful decision: to center those who are too often spoken about, rather than with or through.

Among the stories, The Land of Sad Oranges was the one that struck me most. It’s a deceptively simple piece, but it’s packed with emotional intensity and rich imagery. For me, its power lies in the way Kanafani connects food, family, and land — three elements that are often inseparable in diasporic grief. I’m often drawn to narratives where food becomes a carrier of culture and history, and this story epitomizes that connection. It stayed with me long after I finished it.

The collection closes on a story that takes a different turn from the others. Rather than focusing on exile or flight, it follows a young man who returns to Gaza to visit family and makes the decision to stay. In the context of ongoing violence and genocide, this story takes on a new level of urgency and sorrow. It highlights not only the historical trauma of displacement but also the enduring desire for return. The protagonist’s choice reflects a kind of quiet defiance, a hope for liberation even when surrounded by destruction.

Kanafani’s collection doesn’t offer closure or comfort. Instead, it offers clarity and presence. It reminds us that to understand Palestinian suffering is not to consume it passively, but to listen carefully and to reckon with the systems that sustain it. These stories were written decades ago, and yet they feel painfully current. That, perhaps, is the most devastating thing of all.

[Sonja · Rating 5 out of 5]

❝I was sure that the God we had known in Palestine had left it too, and was a refugee in some place that I did not know❞

This is a really great collection of six short stories and one novella (the titular Men in the Sun). I would highly recommend checking out Kanafani's writing — as his stories offer a real glimpse into the lives of regular Palestinian people post-Nakba (after 1948).

[I will be posting a more thorough review in the future]

[Asim Qureshi · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I posted online that I was about to read 'Men in the Sun' by Ghassan's Kanafani, a friend remarked that it was, "unbearably sad." As someone who works with trauma survivors, I am often confronted with the unbearably sad, but I simply was not prepared for the different ways in which this book would affect me.

Kanafani's prose are remarkably stunning, for the literary aesthete this would be enough, but it is the heart that his writing cuts away at. As a non-Palestinian, he takes us through layers of pain, as he brings realisation that pain for Palestinians is everything from suffering the indignity of being forcefully removed from their lands, to watching an orange shrivel away before them. There is no single formulation of trauma, it surrounds and is imbued in everything that they do since even before the Nakbah.

The translator, Hilary Kirkpatrick, provides an excerpt from a letter written by Kanafani to his son, where he recounts the moment of his son's recognition of his identity,

"I heard you in the other room asking your mother: "Mama, am I a Palestinian?" When she answered "Yes" a heavy silence fell on the whole house. It was as if something hanging over our heads had fallen, it's noise exploding, then - silence.

Afterwards... I heard you crying. I could not move. There was something bigger than my awareness being born in the other room through your bewildered sobbing. It was as if a blessed scalpel was cutting up your chest and putting there the heart that belongs to you...I was unable to move to see what was happening in the other room. I knew, however, that a distant homeland was being born again; hills, plains, olive groves, dead people, torn banners and folded ones, all cutting their way into a future of flesh and blood and being born in the heart of another child...Do not believe that man grows. No; he is born suddenly - a word, in a moment, penetrates his heart to a new throb. One scene can hurl him down from the ceiling of childhood on to the ruggedness of the road."

There is an inter-generational trauma that binds every single instance of pain to subsequent generations of Palestinians. This pain is encumbered though by the sense of betrayal that pervades almost every page of the book. The betrayal of the British, of their Jewish neighbours, of the surrounding Arab countries, of other Palestinians, and even the landscape of the world outside of their homeland, a hostile territory that becomes a prison refuge. As Abu Qais states,

"...the last ten years you have done nothing but wait. You have needed ten big hungry years to be convinced that you have lost your trees, your house, your youth, and your whole village. People have been making their own way during these long years, while you have been squatting like an old dog in a miserable hut. What do you think you were waiting for? Wealth to come through the roof of your house? Your house? It is not your house. A generous man said to you: “Live here!” That is all. And a year later he said to you: “Give me half the room,” so you put up patched sacks between yourself and the new neighbors. You stayed squatting till Saad came and started to shake you as milk is churned to make butter."

There is a sense of humiliation that is attached to the predicament the Palestinian refugees find themselves in. They are no longer able to feel proud of their own achievements, but rather constantly find themselves at the mercy of others. The narrative in places reminds me of Primo Levy's 'If This Is Man', where the abused, downtrodden and tortured do everything they can to survive, including harming their own. This consistent sense of betrayal became exacerbated for me when reference is made by one of the Palestinians that he would prefer to be in al-Jafr prison in Jordan, than having to migrate across the desert to Kuwait. Betrayal seems to run in the lifeblood of al-Jafr, as it came to be used as a CIA black site as part of the US-led War on Terror. Muslim detainees would be sent there from around the world to be tortured by their own ‘brothers’.

Without giving the plot away, it is the interconnectedness of trauma from those who fought for the return of Palestine and lost a great deal, to those who seek refuge and opportunity in perilous circumstances that brings home how difficult the lives of displaced Palestinians became. One act of torture against Abu Khaizuran in Palestine, resulting in the deaths of Palestinians elsewhere.

While some of the themes in the story 'Men in the Sun' are more overt in terms of the difficulties faced, it is stories such as 'The Land of Sad Oranges' that convey the depth of the Nakbah's impact. As the young girl who narrates the story says,

"The tragedy had begun to eat into our very souls."

There is an overwhelming quality to the entire experience that Kanafani so successfully describes. Men, who wish to be men, become emasculated to the point of suicide, as the realisation dawned that Arab armies who were supposed to come to their aid, were no better than their usurpers,

"A diabolical thought had implanted itself in his brain, and he jumped up like a man who has found a satisfactory conclusion. Overwhelmed by his awareness that he was able to put an end to his difficulties, and by the dread of someone who is about to undertake a momentous action, he began to mutter to himself as he turned round and round, looking for something we could not see. Then he pounced on a chest that had accompanied us from Acre and started to scatter its contents with terrible nervous movements. Your mother had understood everything in an instant and, caught up in the agitation that mothers feel when their children are exposed to danger, she set about pushing us out of the room and telling us to run away to the mountain. But we stayed by the window. We plastered our little ears to its shutters, and heard your fathers voice: “I want to kill them. I want to kill myself. I want to be done with ... I want...”Your father fell silent. When we looked into the room again, through the cracks in the door, we saw him lying on the ground, gasping for breath and grinding his teeth as he wept, while your mother sat at one side watching him anxiously."

The journey that the short stories take us through from start to end is one where the layers of what it means to be a Palestinian after the Nakbah are ever so slightly exposed. The collection ends with a letter written from Gaza, and in a way acts as the perfect ending to the story, as it develops from the one who leaves to the one who returns. Kanafani's last story in the collection brings us in a full circle, so that we understand that what was lost for Palestinians is still there, and yet unreachable. Furthermore, the visceral quality of the displaced Palestinian returning to Palestine, reminds us that there are many theatres of resistance, but those who stayed, remain on the front lines. It is the returnee who has sought his place in the world, but only understands where that place is on his return to the place he left.

[Cody · Rating 5 out of 5]

“And the future you're giving me
holds nothing for a gun
I've no wish to be living
sixty years on”

—EJ/BT

[Samra Faruki · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading this book because of the genocide that is taking place in the world right now of the Palestinians by Israel.

These are such harrowing stories I had to take many pauses and breaks when reading. Even though this book is quite short but the tragic stories take a hold on you. I could feel the author’s sadness and pain when reading these stories. Ghassan Kanafani writes it so raw that it is a different kind of beautiful. Ghassan Kanafani is better than many many authors out there. It is sad that his work has not gotten the recognition it deserves.

Growing up in high school, it was required reading to read about the Holocaust and there were fiction books on the Holocaust in our curriculum. This was done to prevent another Holocaust from happening. Yet another genocide is taking place and that of the Palestinians.
I believe it is necessary that Palestinian books be in the curriculum and required reading among all nations.

[Ghada Arafat · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book years ago but I still remember how it made me feel specially that I read it while I was in Gaza during the Intifada. The only thing that made me put it down was when bombing started.

[Thomas Hübner · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://www.mytwostotinki.com/?p=1458

That people are leaving their home countries because they want to find a better life somewhere else is a phenomenon that is probably as old as mankind itself. But to me it seems that the extent and speed of this migration has increased a lot in the 20th and 21st centuries beyond anything experienced before.

Apart from the increase of the number of migrants, there is something else that puzzles me about this development: the cynicism and application of double standards towards migrants. While those of "us" westerners who work for some time or permanently abroad (like the writer of these lines) are usually labeled "expatriates", the words that are used to characterize someone who for good reasons is looking for work in a wealthy country of the West are "economic migrant", "poverty migrant", "illegal immigrant", "asylum shopper" - and these are still the more friendly terms.

When during the existence of the Iron Curtain migration from Eastern Europe was extremely limited, and those who tried to flee were leaving their countries in very dangerous circumstances, these migrants were branded as heroes and freedom fighters who wanted to leave behind a terrible communist dictatorship; now when the same people leave their places for the same reason - an unbearable situation for themselves and their families - they are usually downgraded linguistically a lot.

And those who flee by boat via the Mediterranean to Europe, or to Australia via the Indian Ocean: they all could be saved, but better let them drown so that less of "them" cause "us" any trouble...Welcome to the world of hypocrisy! - the same world that doesn't give a damn about the civilians and children that fall victim to the drone assassinations of the "West" and starts a discussion about the moral implications of this extra-legal killings on a large scale only in that moment when some of the victims happen by chance to be one of "us" (i.e. Christians from Western countries).

Forced migration, ethnic cleansing, the attempt to cross borders in search for a better life, and the situation of exile in general are important topics of the literature of the last decades. The story Men in the Sun by the Palestinian author Ghassan Kanafani is a classic in this respect.

Three Palestinian men that lost their homes in Palestine during the events of 1947/48 (the Naqba, or catastrophe, as it is called by the victims) are in the center of the story. They lead a rather miserable life without any perspective in the huge refugee camps in Jordan, Iraq and other Arab countries. (As an aside: also the Arab countries apply double standards; while "the Palestinians" are usually considered the victims of Zionism/Imperialism, most of the real Palestinians are less welcome by these countries and still live in refugee camps, decades after their eviction. Only Jordan granted the majority of them citizen rights.)

Kuwait, in the early 1960s developing its oil industry, was in this moment for many of these men a kind of Promised Land. Once you made it there (illegally), you had - with a little bit of luck, connections and backshish - a chance to get an employment based on a temporary contract. A unique opportunity to support your beloved one's in the refugee camps, pay for a decent education for your siblings, or prepare to get married.

Basra in Iraq was at that time the place from which many small groups left to make their way past the border guards through the desert. Smuggling refugees was (and is) a very profitable business, and so we witness our three main characters looking for an affordable and reliable guide.

Kanafani made a very good decision to introduce each of the three men, their background and their way of thinking, their different character and outlook on life in a separate chapter.

There is Abu Quais, the oldest of the group. A farmer by profession, who is missing his olive trees in Palestine and who hopes to make enough money in Kuwait to be able to buy saplings for a new olive grove somewhere. In his fatalistic, a bit stubborn way he seems very characteristic for the Palestinian peasant, or the peasant in general.

Then there is young Marwan, who stands up to the financial demands of a particular unpleasant businessmen who insists on a high advance payment and no guarantee for success for the undertaking. Marwan quickly emerges as the unofficial leader of the small group, and we can almost be sure that with his energy and optimism, he can be very successful in Kuwait - if he gets there at all of course.

And then there is the good-hearted, naive Assad. After his brother stopped to send money from Kuwait (he got married and supports his own small family now), he had to stop his studies and tries to get now also to Kuwait.

And there is of course the guide, Abul Khiazuran, who promises to smuggle them in the water tank of his truck through the border checkpoints. If only it wouldn't be so terribly hot in the empty water tank - but it will be ok, if they don't have to wait very long at the checkpoints. Otherwise...

For the reader it is not a surprise that this journey ends in a disaster. When the driver pulls out the bodies of the three men after the border crossing, he - like the reader - is asking himself a startling question:

"The thought slipped from his mind and ran onto his tongue: "Why didn't they knock on the sides of the tank?" He turned right round once, but he was afraid he would fall, so he climbed into his seat and leaned his head on the wheel. "Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you say anything? Why? - The desert suddenly began to send back the echo: "Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why? Why? Why?"

What struck me also about this story was the deep symbolism of the fact that the bodies are deposed at a garbage dump; this is how much a refugee's life is worth. And also the fact that the driver lost his manhood literally as a result of his fight with the Israelis, and is now interested in only one thing: money is of course also charged with a symbolic meaning.

One more thing: there are no antisemitic slurs in any of Kanafani's stories of this collection of stories. Sure, the Jews/Israelis are the enemies of these people; those who are responsible for the loss of their homes, their miserable lives in the refugee camps, and the loss of many lives too. But the enemy is not a demon, just someone who took away the land and existence of people who have lived in Palestine for hundreds of years.

The other stories in this collection are also very good; I was particular impressed by The Land of Sad Oranges, a short story about a family who is forced to flee their home and escape to Lebanon. The few oranges that they can take with them make them cry; a memory of what they lost and will probably never see again.

Ghassan Kanafani (born 1936) was one of the most talented Arabic prose writers. Born in Palestine, he had to leave his home at the age of 12 and shared many experiences of the people in his stories. He became also a political activist and joined the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine of George Habash. Fortunately, his work is not that of a political propagandist; it shows the suffering of the people of Palestine, and asks for empathy from its readers, not for agreement with a political program.

Kanafani was killed by a car-bomb explosion in 1972 in Beirut, together with his niece. Nowadays the assassination would have been executed by a drone. I suppose some people may call that "progress".

[Nahed Elrayes · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't think I've ever read any book - novella or a full-length novel - that fucked me up the way these 52 pages did. It brings a feeling at once uniquely horrific, and familiar: the confusion, the powerlessness, the alienation, the omnipresent sense of betrayal, and above all, the guilt; all of the pathologies and irresolutions that linger in the blood of the diaspora.
Kanafani, who realized in 1962 that the tragic was already the banal in Palestine, deliberately avoids any reference to real political events in his work. Instead, he establishes the novella in the Iraqi desert, with no clear villain, and with a plot which, in its historical context, would be considered very banal.
But the story is not the point.
Kanafani cuts between the political and personal with the kind of effortless economy of style that suggests his subconscious dictated the entire text. Characters like Abul Khaizuran could have been presented as clear symbols, as in Naguib Mahfouz's best work. Instead, they are real. Their essential forms line up exactly with the larger concepts they conjure in the reader's mind. After the last page, there is no pause in the calculation between what you would feel for the characters, what you feel for their political situation, and what you feel for the human condition. They are one and the same emotion.
Although the writing is more cinematic, Kanafani's young obsession with Russian literature shines through; the streams of consciousness could belong to Tolstoy's Ivan Ilyich, and the play of existential harshness against naivety (see: Abu Qais thinking he hears the Earth's heartbeat as he embraces it, but only hearing his own) is beautifully Dostoyevskian.
This is more than a good "Palestinian story". It's a modernist masterpiece, written by a guy in his 20s and rivalling the best of wartime fiction. I can't help wondering what more Kanafani would have produced, if he wasn't assassinated at 36.

[Tsung · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a slim collection of a novella and six short stories which are brilliantly written. Rather than being politically charged, it instead concentrates on more general issues surrounding life and living.

Common themes which appear in the stories are life and on the flipside, death. Also commonly featured are people who are trapped in their circumstances with limited options. There were those trapped by physical injuries and handicaps. There was symbolism and imagery in stories like “The Land of Sad Oranges”, “The Falcon” and “If You were a Horse…”.

In “Men in the Sun”, three men with different backgrounds separately look for someone who can smuggle them across the border into Kuwait. These were desperate men, struggling to survive or to find some way to support their families. They see no way out except through the promise of work in Kuwait. The smuggler himself is also a man stuck in a life situation because of a traumatic past.

“If You were a Horse…” was not just about superstition, but about the perpetuation of false beliefs. The father was also in a quandary when one beloved caused harm to another of his beloved.

“A Hand in the Grave” was a tragicomical story, in which two medical students turned to robbing a grave just to get a skeleton for their studies.

Overall, the stories convey a sense of longing and despair. It is remarkable how Kanafani is able to convey depth within such short stories.

[Hamza · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't think I've ever given a perfect rating to a collection of short stories before, but I really couldn't find any flaws with this one. It's proof that sometimes, less truly is more.

[Zainab · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ghassan Kanafani’s ‘Men in the Sun’ (1962) offers a window into the journeys and dreams (of survival, of a future) of its central Palestinian characters. It is a devastating yet familiar scenario delivered with comedic flair – I laughed out loud a fair few times while reading the Arabic! The character development within the span of this short story is extraordinary. It’s clear Kanafani is a supremely talented fiction writer, who is able to divorce his macrocosmic liberation politics from the deeply personal stories being unearthed by each of the protagonists. Of course, the politics pervades nonetheless.

This story, punctuated by precarious checkpoints and border crossings, may well be familiar to children of immigrants whose parents were exiled from their home countries. I loved reading ‘Men in the Sun’ in Arabic alongside the English. This was a first for me – I’d recommend it for readers who want to try an Arabic novel for the first time. It’s enjoyable, fairly straightforward, and the dialogue is clear to follow. The other short stories in this collection (1958-1969) are tense and ominous, often exploring death, the supernatural, and cultural superstitions. The one that stayed with me the most was ‘If you were a horse…’ but I won't give much away.

Ghassan Kanafani was assassinated by Mossad in 1972 at the age of 36, which makes this surviving collection even more precious.

[Tinea · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short novella about Palestinian refugees struggling to make ends meet and deciding to try and smuggle themselves to Kuwait for work, and some other stories. Good.

Even better was the story of how I came upon this book: A few years ago I spent a little time in the West bank with a guy named Ghassan who was named after poet and author Ghassan Kanafani, the "voice of Palestine." I promised to look him up and never really did. Last week I was checking out used bookstores in Philly, which I was really pumped about after reading some Aaron Cometbus zine in which he reviewed hole-in-the-wall bookstores in New York, and found this gem in the bargain bin outside. This, of course, drew me into the store to make my $2 purchase, where I saw a whole wall of college texts the bookseller was gettin ready to stock, and pointed out some really good ones I'd read. We got talking about college, and my Third World Studies major, which led to talking about my current job, working on coal issues, which led to me giving my big long spiel about the environmental justice issues in SE Ohio, which led to some girl coming down the stairs to shout: "Are you talking about __County??" which I was, and lo and behold I made aquiantaince with one of the few other activists to have devoted any amount of timne to the issue and area.

How fuckin random, right?

[barbara ☾ · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I was sure that the God we had known in Palestine had left it too, and was a refugee in some place that I did not know, unable to find a solution to his own problems."

it's often difficult to imagine tragedies from an outsider's perspective. while fictional, these stories represent the harrowing struggles that palestinians have faced for decades. the anger, sadness, and disappointment bleed off each page. "men in the sun" in particular, the longest short story in this collection, touched me the most because i knew the story wasn't going to end well from the start.

"Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you say anything? Why?"
The desert suddenly began to send back the echo:
"Why didn't you knock on the sides of the tank? Why didn't you bang the sides of the tank? Why? Why? Why?"

the final story "letter from gaza" brings everything full circle and ends with the sentiment that palestinians are still here and the devastations they've been through can't be forgotten by the world. with well-written storytelling, this is a very relevant and important book. it'll always be free palestine.

[Yuri Sharon · Rating 5 out of 5]

The novella that is the title story of this collection was published in 1962, and therefore drawn from the experiences of the first generation of Palestinian refugees. Kanafani’s lucid narratives continue to speak to the following generations’ experience of dispossession and exile; and, I am sure, they also do to refugees from many other parts of our troubled world.
Depicting a world of almost universal betrayal, these beautifully crafted stories are excruciating reading — but they are truly great literature.

[bweadbun]

my favourite stories were “The Land of Sad Oranges” and “Letter from Gaza”

[maha · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a collection of Palestinian short stories, the main one being “Men in the Sun,“ which follows three Palestinian refugees attempting to smuggle their way to Kuwait for better job opportunities. I’ve been wanting to read this book for a long time because of the author, Ghassan Kanafani, a Palestinian revolutionary whose work I’ve read before. He’s simply a fantastic writer and speaker. This book was originally written in Arabic, which one can tell from the way it’s translated. It makes me wish I could understand Arabic because I bet the stories are probably so much more meaningful in Arabic.

“Men in the Sun” reminded me a lot of my own family’s refugee story as my father was born in Kuwait after his father had fled Palestine due to the Nakba only to end up in Syria. I really like how Kanafani first gives each character in the story its own section for the reader to understand their background and then incorporates the characters when they meet on the journey to Kuwait. This story was definitely one of my favorite ones in the book and it was really heartbreaking.

My other favorite short stories are “The Land of Sad Oranges” and “Letter from Gaza.” I really liked “The Land of Sad Oranges” because it’s about the city of Yaffa, which is where my grandfather was from. It just felt like I got a glimpse into what life must have been like for him and so many other Palestinian farmers and refugees. “Letter from Gaza” really made me tear up. It’s wild to think that it was written in 1956, because it could have easily been written right now. It breaks my heart to see how much loss and pain was already present back then and how it’s only gotten worse. I 100% would recommend this book to anyone interested in Palestine—it’s truly timeless.

[Mutia · Rating 5 out of 5]

type of story that will shatter you into million pieces

“I heard you in the other room asking your mother, 'Mama, am I a Palestinian?' When she answered 'Yes' a heavy silence fell on the whole house. It was as if something hanging over our heads had fallen, its noise exploding, then - silence. Afterwards...I heard you crying. I could not move. There was something bigger than my awareness being born in the other room through your bewildered sobbing. It was as if a blessed scalpel was cutting up your chest and putting there the heart that belongs to you...I was unable to move to see what was happening in the other room. I knew, however, that a distant homeland was being born again: hills, olive groves, dead people, torn banners and folded ones, all cutting their way into a future of flesh and blood and being born in the heart of another child...Do you believe that man grows? No, he is born suddenly - a word, a moment, penetrates his heart to a new throb. One scene can hurl him down from the ceiling of childhood onto the ruggedness of the road.”

[Daniel Slusser · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read “Men in the Sun” and “Letter from Gaza”

Both stories I read from this collection were not only heartbreaking and incredibly raw, but deeply moving. With the current genocide happening against Palestinians and people in Gaza, this is a must read for EVERYONE, especially with the narrative that this is a new thing. Words are power, and Kanafani uses them as his weapon in this collection.

May Kanafani, his niece, and every Palestinian have peace.

[charlotte, · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rep: Palestinian cast