The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between

by Hisham Matar

My cousin Nafa stood up and read: The wind roared against the tent that stood alone in the desert. Its pegs were firmly planted in the sand. The time was midnight. Darkness perched over the world. The moon, having just taken off its deep red garment, passed now, stretching through the spacious skies. Stillness spread its curtain over everything. The only sounds that could be heard were those of the grazing camels and the lazy melody of the sheep’s bleating. Wonderment dominated the universe. Fear had rooted itself into the lives of those who inhabited these parts. Everyone was afraid except the men in the tent: Ahmed, who was his mother’s only son, and his maternal uncle. Accompanying them was the uncle’s family. Despite the specter of the enemy, who threatened everyone on this land, Ahmed and his uncle had ventured out to these plains to tend to their livestock. Nothing mattered to them more than the well-being of their flock. Fear was kept at bay because they had sufficient weapons and ammunition, which, on a previous confrontation, they had captured from the enemy. The “enemy” was the Italian Army unit that was sneaking into the camp to steal the livestock. “The enemy’s eyes,” we are told, “never sleep.” Once surrounded, the uncle, who is an old man: hears inside his chest the defiant cry of a young rebel. He is transformed, feels a bitter strength, and is emboldened by a youthful vigor that, at any moment, is liable to fade, and self-discipline earned by old age and a ...