The Land of the Sad Orange
Ghassan Kanafani in: “ The Land of the Sad Orange”
Ghassan Kanafani was born in Akka Palestine in 1936 and died, as a result of an Israeli bomb planted to his car on 8th July 1972. His Danish wife Annie, described the event saying: “…We used to go shopping together every Saturday morning, on that day he accompanied his niece Lamees. A few minutes after they left, I heard the sound of a huge explosion. I ran but only saw remanence of our exploded small car. Lamees was a few meters away from the spot, but I could not find Ghassan. I hoped to find him injured, but I only found his left leg. I was devastated, and our son Fayez, started knocking his head against the wall. Little layla was crying: Baba…Baba…I gathered his remains, the Beiruti escorted him to his last resting place at the Shuhada Cemetery where he was buried next to Lamees who loved him and died with him“ 1 Kanafani is a prominent literary figure in the Arabic Literature and worldwide. His works were translated to many different languages. During his short life he enriched the Arabic library by with valuable collection of publications, varying from novel to short story to literary researches and political essays. “The Land of the Sad Orange” is one of his early stories that depicts the influence of the deportation on the Palestinians when the Israeli troops took over their country in 1948. In this story Kanafani mixes the artistic reality with the historical one. Though the story tells the suffering of a middle class family, it stands as an example of thousands of displaced families who had to suffer the humiliation of leaving their country and living in poverty, following the 1948 calamity that befell the Palestinians after the defeat of the Arab armies and the creation of the state of Israel
N. Habib
The Land of the Sad Orange When we left Java to Akka, I felt no agony, it was like going from a city to another for a holiday. For several days, nothing painful happened, I was happy because this move
Ghassan Kanafani was born in Akka Palestine in 1936 and died, as a result of an Israeli bomb planted to his car on 8th July 1972. His Danish wife Annie, described the event saying: “…We used to go shopping together every Saturday morning, on that day he accompanied his niece Lamees. A few minutes after they left, I heard the sound of a huge explosion. I ran but only saw remanence of our exploded small car. Lamees was a few meters away from the spot, but I could not find Ghassan. I hoped to find him injured, but I only found his left leg. I was devastated, and our son Fayez, started knocking his head against the wall. Little layla was crying: Baba…Baba…I gathered his remains, the Beiruti escorted him to his last resting place at the Shuhada Cemetery where he was buried next to Lamees who loved him and died with him“ 1 Kanafani is a prominent literary figure in the Arabic Literature and worldwide. His works were translated to many different languages. During his short life he enriched the Arabic library by with valuable collection of publications, varying from novel to short story to literary researches and political essays. “The Land of the Sad Orange” is one of his early stories that depicts the influence of the deportation on the Palestinians when the Israeli troops took over their country in 1948. In this story Kanafani mixes the artistic reality with the historical one. Though the story tells the suffering of a middle class family, it stands as an example of thousands of displaced families who had to suffer the humiliation of leaving their country and living in poverty, following the 1948 calamity that befell the Palestinians after the defeat of the Arab armies and the creation of the state of Israel
N. Habib
The Land of the Sad Orange When we left Java to Akka, I felt no agony, it was like going from a city to another for a holiday. For several days, nothing painful happened, I was happy because this move