Mauritanian novelist Moussa Ould Ebnou’s science fiction novel Barzakh: The Land In-Between takes the reader on an epic journey through space and time. In an unknown distant future, researchers from the Archaeological Institute of Human Thought manage to extract memory transcripts from an ancient skeleton buried on top of Ghallawiya mountain. Starting in an eleventh-century desert village and ending in the fictitious Republic of Barzakh of the 2050s, these memories tell the story of Gara, a young man abducted into slavery by travelling salt merchants, and his struggle to escape what he increasingly perceives to be the inherent evils of humanity.
Since Gara’s death is established at the beginning, the entire novel is basically a flashback – or rather, a series of flashbacks that takes us through three distinct time periods separated by the narrator’s near-death experiences. Taking its name from a Muslim concept denoting a place between life and death where souls gather before going on to the afterlife, Barzakh is very much a book in-between: set in a geography comprised of both real and (semi-)mythic places, and incorporating elements from Mauritanian history and Islamic tradition alike, the story jumps between science fiction, historical fiction, and dystopian narrative, thereby reflecting the narrator’s increasing inability to know himself.
That Gara is not the most reliable of narrators becomes clear pretty soon: for all his introspection and pondering on humanity’s corrupted nature, there are some remarkable blind spots in his perception. While he personally resents his own enslavement, the idea that slavery as an institution may be wrong only arises when it is suggested by others. The stoning of a young bride in one of the villages the caravan stops at is merely background noise, and at no point does it occur to Gara to question whether the cruelty with which the caravan men treat their animals might also be morally questionable. On the other hand, sequences such as Gara’s surprisingly detailed imagining of what the caravan leader is thinking about when he starts lagging behind at some point (i.e., the many creative ways he could take revenge on his wife, whom he suspects of being unfaithful to him) alert us to the fact that this is a book in which reading between the lines is as important as what is actually being said.
Throughout the novel, it is intriguing what is left out and what is described in detail. When, after a long and arduous journey, Gara’s caravan reaches the city of Ghana, which he says had ‘always fascinated’ him, his stay there is quickly skipped over with little more information than that they ‘stayed [there] for three weeks.’ In contrast, the novel abounds in detailed descriptions of the desert landscapes the protagonist passes through, some of which are achingly beautiful. This is a landscape ‘carved… by the light and wind’, in which people measure the time by the length of shadows, and shadows themselves almost behave like people, stretching out ‘lazily’, ‘caressing’ the sand. Destinations, it turns out, are not where the story is at; rather, this is a book that is all about the journey.
Torn between his loathing of his fellow people and a deep longing for a more meaningful connection both with them and with the unconscious parts of himself that remain hidden from him, Gara is, however, ultimately unable to enjoy the ride. Seemingly unclear himself whether what he is seeking is solitude or a better humanity, he keeps circling back on himself, watching his former potential futures turn to myths of the past, encountering people and places that, though separated by centuries, remain strangely reminiscent of one another.
Though acutely aware of my own shortcomings as a reader in this case (I had never read any African science fiction before, and my ignorance of Islamic tradition is considerable), I found Barzakh to be an enjoyable read. This was not least due to the originality and beauty of the descriptive passages (masterfully rendered into English by translator Marybeth Timmermann). Admittedly, though, they tend to be rather lengthy, so if fast-paced and action-packed is what you like, Barzakh may not be the book for you. To all those who do have the patience, I would recommend to dive in and expect the unexpected.
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This innovative masterpiece symphonizes mysticism, religion, philosophy, and Mauritanian culture into a dystopian reflection on the human condition.