Sulayman: The Hero of Sulayman and the Green Lamp
You may have seen our hero Sulayman in our previous books The Tree of Light or The Secret Blessing.
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Our hero began his preparation for the Al Chemya school by learning from his Grandfather and playing with his brother, our sidekick Yusuf. In our new novel Sulayman and the Green Lamp the boys are beginning their studies at Al Chemya, a famous Sufi school from the Golden Age of Islam. What I am hoping to achieve with the Sulayman character is a model of the self evolving organism. This is a philosophical concept that we as individuals needn’t wait millions of years to develop our higher capacities but that we may, through spiritual training, evolve within ourselves instead of awaiting the glacial flow of organic evolution.
In Sulayman I also wanted to avoid a flat character, or a character that is merely a sort of observer of the story instead of a driver of the story. An example of a flat character would be Sherlock Holmes for instance, utterly brilliant but also utterly predictable. It is my hope that Sulayman will at times surprise us, and himself, though his quests. In our first novel Sulayman is beginning his studies at the Al Chemya school and he is struggling with some common base emotions like jealousy and anger. He has very good reasons to experience these emotions but as the purpose of spiritual training is to master the nafs (the ego). Sulayman must develop and become more than what he was in order to succeed in his quest.
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When I considered what a Muslim hero would look like it did seem like he would be a very physical sort, with a sword and bow. These are elements of the story arc, but perhaps not in our first book. I also wanted to emphasize that it is the internal, rather than the external struggle that is important. As we all progress through life we see that there are people around us who never progressed past childhood in their behaviour and expression. Infantile character challenges are normal to children but not normal in adults, however common they may be. Among the other elements that Sulayman interacts with in the story each is at their own stage of development and our hero marks the line between the guided and the misguided in his relations towards the auxiliary characters.
If you would like to read about the preschool education of our hero Sulayman before he begins his studies at Al Chemya please see: The Tree of Light v.1 , The Tree of Light v.2 or The Secret Blessing
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