Season of migration to the North

Tayeb Salih

Heinemann

1970

176 páginas

5h 52m

ISBN-10: 0435900668

After years of study in Europe, the young narrator of Season of Migration to the North returns to his village along the Nile in the Sudan. It is the 1960s, and he is eager to make a contribution to the new postcolonial life of his country. Back home, he discovers a stranger among the familiar faces of childhood—the enigmatic Mustafa Sa’eed. Mustafa takes the young man into his confidence, telling him the story of his own years in London, of his brilliant career as an economist, and of the series of fraught and deadly relationships with European women that led to a terrible public reckoning and his return to his native land.

But what is the meaning of Mustafa’s shocking confession? Mustafa disappears without explanation, leaving the young man—whom he has asked to look after his wife—in an unsettled and violent no-man’s-land between Europe and Africa, tradition and innovation, holiness and defilement, and man and woman, from which no one will escape unaltered or unharmed.

Season of Migration to the North is a rich and sensual work of deep honesty and incandescent lyricism. In 2001 it was selected by a panel of Arab writers and critics as the most important Arab novel of the twentieth century.

Resenhas (1)

4 (Muito bom)

“Everything which happened before my meeting her was a premonition; everything I did after I killed her was an apology; not for killing her, but for the lie that was my life.”

Completamente entendo o porquê de esse livro ser considerado um dos melhores da literatura sudanesa. As discussões sobre pós-colonialismo, fetichização e amor são apresentadas em uma narrativa que balanceia dois focos diferentes, estabelecendo paralelos entre a vida de Mustafa Sa'eed e a do narrador; a influência de Mustafa parece ser transmitida através da confissão de seu passado ao personagem, assemelhando o fim de ambos. O que me chama atenção é a forma como o primeiro apresenta disposição ao distanciamento de suas origens, enquanto o último tem grande parte de sua narrativa centrada nelas. Ainda assim, o encaixe de Mustafa como um estereótipo pelos ingleses é posteriormente definido por ele mesmo como uma mentira ("This Mustafa Sa'eed does not exist. He's an illusion, a lie.").
Achei o ritmo narrativo bom, com exceção de uma seção no meio com menos foco na história de Mustafa. A escrita conta com descrições e metáforas lindas, e temas recorrentes bem estabelecidos, conseguindo caracterizar até personagens menores dentro do enredo. Quatro estrelas, com certeza recomendo.