Why we need Sulayman and the Green Lamp
For several years before I began outlining for Sulayman and the Green Lamp parents were coming to my workshops, holiday parties and plays for children. They would tell me that they loved the Arabian Nights feel of our gatherings and how lovely it would be to have a children’s fiction series for the setting and stories we were celebrating.
I began to reflect on what these educated, progressive parents were speaking about, a fiction series that commented on their culture and our shared spiritual context. They would tell me that they wanted a Muslim Harry Potter. This sounded like a lovely idea and my sons had often asked me for the same thing when I wrote for them but it had been so long since I had written novel length fiction, although I did win a book award for young adult fiction in junior high. My other books are short story books for children and reimagined history stories for young adults but Sulayman the Green Lamp is a more ambitious project and in the end I decided that I needed this series for my children as much as the other families that follow my work have expressed.
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I decided to test the genre by writing a series of histories where I would introduce my main characters and build their context while retelling the histories of the Prophets based on the stories of Hajjah Amina Adil (q). This was well received in my own Sufi community but not so well received by fundamentalist Muslims who did not appreciate any creative license in religious subject matter. The spiritual Muslims continued to encourage me and say that “this was the genre they had been waiting for.”
Sulayman and the Green Lamp is a refreshing take on the Arabian Nights world and the reason we need it is that the identity and integrity of spiritual Muslims is under attack from both sides. Moderate Muslims are criticized by people who fear immigrants and moderate Muslims are also criticized by fundamentalists who want to control all aspects of our religion and more or less squash our spirituality. Spiritual Muslims are discouraged by extremists who do not want to celebrate Mawlid (our Christmas) and restrict other celebrations and creative endeavors. Those of us who ignore this pressure want more creative fiction for our children that touches on our identity, engages our spiritual dimension and celebrates the beautiful culture of the Muslim world. We want our children to identify with the beauty and to resist these other restrictive influences. I certainly hope that Sualyman and the Green Lamp is only the beginning of this genre and that similar fiction stories and series are created to share the beauty of many other cultures that are marginalized by fear and suppression.
If you would like a preview of the characters and style of the Sulayman and the Green Lamp series please see The Tree of Light Series and The Secret Blessing: The Dala’il al Kharyrat for Children.
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