لقاء معي ع موقع أرب ليت – باسم سليمان

Syrian writer Basem Suleiman was a finalist for the 2024 prize with his story “Zorba’s Dance” (رقصة زوربا). This project is funded by the British Council’s Beyond Literature Borders programme corun by Speaking Volumes Live Literature Productions.

Tell us about a short-story author whose work you particularly admire.

Basem Suleiman: It might be strange to say, but the fables of Aesop, that Greek slave who was described as “an ugly slave, potbellied, warped-headed, flat-nosed, dark-skinned, dwarfish, bow-legged, short-armed, cross-eyed, and cleft-lipped.” And yet he was able to father the short story, along with the wise man Paedia. I want to know how he tamed Greek society and became their wise man through the medium of the story, even though the ancient Greeks despised slaves, so much so that the Roman orator Quantilian, in the first century AD, said that the worst thing that a novice orator encounters is practicing the role of a slave, since the slave has neither literary nor artistic ability, and therefore has no gift for oratory. Yet this is contradicted by Aesop’s stories, which formed one of the foundations of the Greek and Roman culture that came after him, so much so that Socrates recalled these stories hours before his death. This slave, who was represented in Greek statuary, was described by Phaedrus, another slave freed from bondage in Rome and who translated Aesop’s fables into Latin: “The Athenians erected a statue in honor of the genius Aesop. In so doing, they placed a slave in a position of immortal fame. This symbolizes that all men should know that the path of honor remains open to them, and that glory is granted, not on the basis of lineage, but according to merit.” What I mean is that Aesop laid the first brick in the role of literature at the level of the individual and society, which is freedom!

If you were to start a literary prize, what would it be for, how would it be judged, and what would people win?

Basem Suleiman: I would choose an award for the story, as the novel has been chiseled into this historical and artistic role for many reasons, some of which are bad, and yet the story still has a lot to say, and hence I’d choose an award for it that would restore some of its glory. The most important point in my opinion, or as I like the story to be, and which the judges would rely on, is the opposite of what most agree on in defining the short story; that is, that it’s a model of condensation, and that it’s about taking a certain slice of life and processing it. In addition to that, it’s said that the short story hates prolixity and tends toward brevity, based on the rule of Edgar Allan Poe, that the story should be read in one sitting. I see the story as retrieving an invisible and completely neglected moment in time, then extending it in time and space and giving it life, which is the opposite of condensation and brevity. What I mean is that I follow the method Aesop used in the story of the crow who found a jar of water, so he threw pebbles into it until the water level in the jar rose and the crow drank. This story has many interpretations, the most important of which is that it breaks with the arrogant belief that the human is the only creature who has intelligence. As for what prizes I will give the contestants, there is no alternative to money, as money is the first abstract symbolic story invented by man.

  Tell us about an opening sentence you find particularly compelling, in any work of fiction.

Basem Suleiman: The opening sentence of Gabriel García Márquez’s novel Chronicle of a Death Foretold: “On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on.” It is an extraordinary sentence, which undermines all the horizons of expectation on which plot in literary narratives is built, as if this were Alexander, when the Macedonians tested whether or not he was worthy of leadership. They brought before him a rope with a knot that could never be untied and asked Alexander to untie it. Alexander cut it with his sword! And after that, he changed the face of the ancient world. The question that comes to mind after Márquez’s opening is: What can be narrated after that brilliant sentence? But there was much to be narrated after it, and this is true literature that invents its own land from nothing.

Editor’s note: Although Basem shared the quote in Arabic, here, we have used the English translation by Gregory Rabassa.

What author, living or dead,  would you like to have on WhatsApp?  

Basem Suleiman: Scheherazade!

What advice on writing—that you were told, or perhaps read somewhere—do you find most useless, stupid, or ridiculous?

Basem Suleiman: I’ve never thought about it!

What advice on writing—that you were told or perhaps read somewhere—have you found most useful and nourishing?

Basem Suleiman: I’ve never thought about it!

When did you start writing? Do you remember anything about the first piece you ever wrote, or the place that you wrote it?

Basem Suleiman: My first writings were on the pages of law books at university. They were just poetic lines that had gotten separated from their poems or sentences that were the basis for stories I wrote later. As for the first story I wrote, it was about a fly that befriends a boy with autism.

Tell us about one of the main places where you write. Is it at a desk, on a couch, in bed? At a coffeeshop? Secretly, while at work?

Basem Suleiman: I write anywhere, although on the condition that I feel that I am not visible to anyone, because when I write I feel naked, and it is not appropriate to be naked in front of others!

  What is one poem you have memorized that you sometimes recite to yourself?

Basem Suleiman: “المتجردة” by Al-Nabigha Al-Dhubyani.

If this short story of yours was adapted into a film, who would you like to act in it? Do you have any advice for the director, videographer, or costume designer?

Basem Suleiman: The director should be Quentin Tarantino; unfortunately, I don’t like giving advice.

 If you were asked to design a bookshop near your home, what would you make sure it had? Comfortable chairs? A hidden nook for reading? Coffee and tea? Something else?

Basem Suleiman: All of the above.

If you were going to write using a pen name or pseudonym, what would it be?

Basem Suleiman: Basem Suleiman.

Where do you find new stories that you enjoy reading? Do you find them in magazines, online, from particular publishers? How do you discover new writing?

Basem Suleiman: In books of history and heritage, that’s where I find the stories I love!

What is your favorite under-appreciated short-story collection?

Basem Suleiman: Just a Kiss, published in 2009 and again in 2019.

Did you have a favorite book, story, or poem as a child or teen? What has its impact on you been?

Basem Suleiman: The illustrated series Treasure Island: Fifteen Men on a Dead Man’s Chest.

If you could change one thing about how publishing works, what would it be?

Basem Suleiman: Nothing can be changed in Arabic publishing as long as the number of readers remains few to none. We need more readers, and then the changes will be constructive.

Basem Suleiman is a writer, poet, and critic from Syria with a BA in Law from Damascus University. He writes for several Arab magazines, newspapers, and websites, and has many published works including two novels: Nokia, published by Dar Lilit in 2014, Egypt, and by Dar Seen in 2018, Damascus; and A Crime in Al-Qabbani Theater / Limit and Suspicion, published by Dar Meem in 2020, Algeria. He has also published stories, including Tamaman Qibla, published by Dar Kiwan in 2009 and by Dar Seen in 2019; and White Butterflies published by Dar Maysaloon in 2003. His most recent poetry includes My Head is Expansive, My Body is Standing, and I Am a Fraction Between Numbers, in the Transformations Series by the Arab Center for Journalism in 2023, Egypt.