A memorable, funny ‘invisible’ woman

Because she has trouble with the outside world, most of this book takes place inside her head

AN UNNECESSARY

WOMAN Rabih Alameddine Loot.co.za (R186)

Corsair

AALIYA SALEH, the narrator of An Unnecessary Woman is a character that reminds one of Renée Michel, the concierge of the novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog, written by Muriel Barbary.

Both are invisible women, who build small lives and rituals in which to bury themselves and hide from the world. Insignificant to the people around them, they have burrowed themselves into little domestic holes from which they observe, but seldom interact with, the world. But both also have secret lives more vivid and exciting than their appearances would ever reveal. Indeed, their appearance – dowdy, a little unkempt, certainly averse to any external standards of beauty – seems almost carefully nurtured in order to keep their private universes from being breached in any way by curious outsiders.

But while the protagonist of The Elegance of the Hedgehog lives in Paris, where things work fairly well, Aaliya is a Beiruti and must live her small, safe life within the context of a large political forces that render life not just difficult – often there is no water, no electricity – but dangerous.

And so, Alameddine succeeds in telling not just the story of a 72-year-old woman but of a city that – even as recently as a week ago – remains almost constantly under siege from opposing forces wreaking havoc with guns and explosives. The tenuousness and difficulty of life is the background against which the citizens of Beirut must daily try to weave meaningful lives for themselves. This provides an interesting, bracing edge to the narrative, which is in essence about the insignificant life of an “unnecessary” woman.

The book starts with Aaliyah accidentally dyeing her hair blue. Soon we become aware of the breadth of Aaliyah’s “real” life. She is a translator and, at the beginning of each year, she decides which book to translate into Arabic next. So far, she has translated 37 books. Once they’ve been translated, she puts them into a box in what used to be the maid’s room of her apartment. No one ever sees her work.

“I long ago abandoned myself to a blind lust for the written word,” Aaliyah tells the reader. “Literature is my sandbox… It is the world outside that box that gives me trouble… Literature gives me life and life kills me.”

Because she has trouble with the outside world, most of this book takes place inside her head. And since her head is filled with literature, that is what we get: a book that is a love song to the saving graces literature bestows on readers.

However, while literature is this novel’s (and its narrator’s) primary joy, you do not need to know and love literature to enjoy the book. Aaliyah’s acerbic humour and her wry observations of a world constantly in conflict with itself make for amusing page turning. Her disdain for politics and its drivers is underpinned by a stoic pragmatism in the face of the ruins these leave of the cities and lives they affect. Her neatness, her cleanliness and orderliness play up as both touchingly poignant and utterly necessary.

Having early on lost all currency in the world (by having been left by a man after a short marriage), Aaliyah gained something so precious she is willing to protect it with an AK-47: a space of her own.

Her flat is her world and if it requires her to take some unusual steps to acquire a weapon to defend it, then those are steps she takes willingly – even happily. How she comes by the weapon is a lovely story within a story.

Family (its duties, disappointments and exasperations), politics and literature are the threads with which Alameddine weaves a most satisfying and beautiful novel. But an almost incidental pleasure of the novel is how the author pays homage to the noble art of finding and doing work that is satisfying and pleasurable, thereby giving a respite from life while also providing it with meaning.

“I think that at times,” Aaliyah says, “…when I am translating, my head is like skylight. Through no effort of my own, I’m visited by bliss… During these moments, I am no longer my usual self, yet I am wholeheartedly myself, body and spirit. During these moments, I am healed of all wounds.”

“Happy work” – by 21st century standards – is an oxymoron for most people. To see how a woman with few opportunities and dreary vistas is able to transcend the difficulty and dreariness of life by pursuing work she loves, is a delight. Not enough, I feel, is written about the joy of absorbing activities.

Aaliyah’s blue hair, however, signals to the reader that the small life she has made for herself is about to change in a small way that is all a piece of her small life.

The change is, nevertheless, memorable, sweet and funny. This book is – also like The Elegance of the Hedgehog – intelligent and heartwarming.