“I want you to be a formidable wolf like your father”: Gender dynamics and desert modernity in contemporary Khaleeji fiction

Abstract This study examines novels by two contemporary Khaleeji authors and their engagement with desert modernity. Their works challenge the romanticization of the desert in modern Arabic literature as a pre-modern space defined and dominated by men. Examining Amal al-Fārān’s Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] and ʿAbd Allah al-Buṣayyiṣ’s Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf], both published in 2016, the study aims to demonstrate how desert space is used to question and redefine concepts of belonging, alienation, agency, and gender. Al-Fārān counters the dichotomous representation of male domination/female subordination through female characters who assert their agency in different power structures; similarly, al-Buṣayyiṣ’s Ṣaʿlūk figure reflects the diversified desert community in a contemporary context, shedding light on alienated personas erased from the collective memory of the desert.


Introduction
Since its modern European origins, the novel has been known as the literary form most closely associated with the city and sedentary societies.Poetry, in contrast, dominates and shapes the literary output of the desert and its dwellers.Such poetry often reflects introspective attempts to probe the depths of human experiences and how they are shaped by the surrounding environment.In the late twentieth century, Arabic literature sought to aesthetically respond to the process of urbanization in Arab societies, particularly in post-oil Gulf societies (Albazei, 2013, p. 29).The rise of the novel in this context depicts the impact of the rapid modernization of these societies and how it produces a sense of fragmentation of the self and society.The desire for modernization and progress has not drastically changed the cultural structure or locale per se; rather, it has reshaped the society's relationship to its heritage and environment (Albazei).In the context of modern Arabic literature, the desert is a significant motif in the Arabic novel that has continued to evolve conceptually into what is now dubbed desert modernity.In this age of modernity, the desert is not merely a setting for the novel but also a space that highlights the tensions and complexity of the human experience in relation to the society, heritage, and the environment.
This study aims to trace the shift in the representation of the desert in Arabic novels by examining how the younger generation of Khaleeji authors engage with the desert environment and shed light on aspects of the gender dynamics of those who inhabit it.It explores how these authors challenge the older generation's dominant representation of the desert, despite the temporal and spatial gap between these younger generations and desert life.It does so by examining two recent literary works from the Gulf, Amal al-Fārān's Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The Desert Divers] (Al-Fārān, 2016) and ʿAbd Allah al-Buṣayyiṣ's Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The Taste of the Wolf] (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016), both of which contest the romanticized notion of the desert by discussing the complex, existential human issues facing people today as an extension of the struggles of the old life in the desert.

Desert as a romanticized space
The Egyptian writer Sabri Musa was the first major writer to explore the desert in his novel Seeds of Corruption (1973Corruption ( /2002)), a tale about the search for salvation through the desert.Similarly, the Libyan writer Ibrahim al-Koni draws on the desert in his work; the desert is a prominent theme and depicted as an existential realm in his two acclaimed novels The Bleeding of the Stone (1990Stone ( /2002) ) and Gold Dust (Al-Koni, 1990).Both writers perceive the desert as a symbol of human existence that aims to resist the ruin of modern society.
Regarding the Arabian Gulf region, ʿAbd al-Rahman Munif remains the most influential and notable author to engage with the deserts of the Arabian Peninsula.In his novel Endings (1977/ 2007) and the monumental quintet Cities of Salt (1989), Munif addresses the massive transformations of the region ensuing the advent of oil.The desert has also featured in more recent novels from the region such as Raja Alem's My Thousand and One Nights (1998), Turkī al-Ḥamad's Sharq al-wādī [East of the valley] ( Al-Ḥamad, 2003), and Yaḥyā Qāsim's Sāq al-ghurāb [The crow's leg] (Qāsim, 2008).These authors attempt to historize the transformations that occurred following the discovery of oil; their works, hence, often romanticize the pre-oil past while critiquing modern life and lamenting the subsequent loss of tradition and cultural identity.
In his 1991 book Thaqāfat al-ṣaḥrāʾ [The Culture of the Desert], Saudi author and critic Saad Albazei discusses desert literature, referring to the romanticization of the desert that tends to neglect the negative and practical aspects of desert life and its harsh circumstances.This culture emerges as a reaction against modernity and the impact of modernization on the space, culture, and identity of post-oil Gulf societies.In a constantly changing world, the emerging desert culture seeks to adhere to some of the old values that have started to disappear, as a basis for maintaining a stable and well-defined identity.Idealizing desert culture is seemingly an extension of the Romantic attitude toward nature and the past.Most Arabic desert writings share the Romantic tendency to reject modern society and the desire for a lost past, while expressing loss, melancholy, and nostalgia in the process.They emphasize Bedouin ideals such as hospitality, generosity, solidarity, and bravery as ways to protest the modern society and its more individual-oriented values.
In Romanticism Against the Tide of Modernity, Michael Löwy and Robert Sayre (Löwy & Sayre, 2001) argue that Romanticism is essentially a response to the modern capitalist society through emphasizing the values of the pre-modern past.They explore the idealization of the past as one of the most defining characteristics in Romanticism, writing: The past is the period in which the various modern alienations did not yet exist.Romantic nostalgia looks to a pre-capitalist past, or at least to a past in which the modern socioeconomic system was not yet fully developed . . .The Romantic vision selects a moment from the actual past in which the harmful characteristics of modernity did not yet exist and in which the human values that have been since stifled by modernity were still operative; that moment is then transformed into a utopia shaped as the embodiment of Romantic aspiration.(Löwy & Sayre,p. 22) Ibrahim al-Koni's literary production is a typical example of this tendency in Arabic desert fiction where the desert is portrayed as an escape or a haven from the evil of enforced modernization.Critics have examined how al-Koni perceives the desert as mythical, stating, "The desert is foremost an existential question.It is a symbol of human existence . . .desert is not a physical place but becomes a transcendental place, a shadow of place" (Hastrup, 2014). 1   The critical celebration of the mythical dimension of desert fiction is prevalent in Arabic scholarship.For instance, Miral Al-Tahawy (2008) seeks to extrapolate the mythical aspect of Arabic desert novels and how the desert, as a male-dominated space, is perceived as the ultimate embodiment of sanctities.Salah Salih's (1996) significant examination of Arab novels that employs the desert leitmotif concentrates on the literary aesthetics of the novels in terms of the structure, techniques, and poetic romanticized expression of the desert that render Arabic novels unique and "authentic."The current critical investigation demonstrates how authors have taken a critical and aesthetic approach in their representation of the desert as a response to modernity and its values.Hence, less attention is paid to the shift of representation of the desert in recent desert writings, especially those on the Arabian desert, a place that has witnessed the most massive transformations in a relatively short period of time due to oil wealth. 2

Desert modernity: Theme and contributions
This study does not focus on the romanticization of the desert in literary works, as is the case in dominant scholarship.Rather, it examines the recent Khaleeji desert literature and how it is far from nostalgic or sentimental.The literary depiction of the desert is more than a mere response to modernity, but it is placed within the canon/scope of desert modernity.It challenges the sustained dominant desert narrative by exploring different dimensions of the desert.It revisits the past, not to idealize it but to highlight the need for people to establish a new relationship with the civilizational variables and to challenge the societal misconceptions about gender images and roles.This study aims to analyze two recent literary works from the Gulf, Amal al-Fārān's Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] (Al-Fārān, 2016) and ʿAbd Allah al-Buṣayyiṣ's Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016), and it argues that both these writers subvert the stereotype of their own gender experiences to challenge the dominant narrative.In these novels, the desert has been "utilized as a space where questions of displacement, identity and belonging are tested and refigured (Alrabei, 2022, p. 85)."It is also used as an arena for struggle and for challenging the dichotomous representation of gender and autonomy in the desert society.
Thus, the current study aims to re-examine the male-centered culture that dominates Arabic desert literature and expand our understanding of the desert in relation to rapidly changing societies.Further, it aims to examine how the young generation writing on the desert redefines concepts of belonging, alienation, agency, and gender.The first section of analysis argues that al-Fārān's Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] challenges the notion of the desert as a flat, repressive, male-dominated space, as it has been continually presented in Gulf societies and literature.The second section explores how al-Buṣayyiṣ's Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] sheds light on a marginalized male persona that opposes the dominant tribal narrative, which revolves around heroism and values a specific form of masculinity.

Women's agency in Al-Fārān's Ghawwāṣū Al-Aḥqāf [the desert divers]
Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] (Al-Fārān, 2016), written by Saudi novelist Amal al-Fārān, has been critically acclaimed and received the Sheikh Zayed Book Award for literary works in 2019.Al-Fārān's novel narrates life in the early twentieth century in an Arabian desert oasis called al-ʿAqīq, inhabited by three families descended from a man called Māniʿ.While each family lives in a different neighborhood, they all engage in endless wars and predatory raids with the aim of asserting dominion.Rather than revolving around one or more specific characters with a singlestory structure, the novel seems to present a chorus of voices with varied experiences, reflecting the perspectives and struggles of the whole community.Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] challenges the dichotomous representation of male domination/female subordination typically found in desert narratives in Arabic literature, by aesthetically reconstructing a collective memory of an era, highlighting a multi-layered historical account of the social, cultural, and economic aspects.Through a panoramic depiction of multiple female characters who assert their agency within different power structures, al-Fārān's representation of the desert transcends the romanticized image of a pre-modern space that tends to be purely defined and dominated by men, to reflect the complex dynamics of power that shape women's experiences.
Scholarship on Muslim women in general, and Arab women in particular, has been dominated by a victim narrative which portrays these women as passive, oppressed, and subjected to male dominance. 3In response, feminist scholarship has witnessed an emerging interest in attending to the complexity of women and gender in non-Western societies, and this is usually governed by oppressed/oppressor dynamics.In this recent interdisciplinary scholarship, the emphasis is placed on how women resist or subvert the power structure through the everyday politics of their interpersonal lives.For example, the anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod describes gender relations in a Bedouin community in Egypt's desert in influential works such as Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society (Abu-Lughod, 1986), "The Romance of Resistance: Tracing Transformations of Power through Bedouin Women" (Abu-Lughod, 1990), Writing Women's Worlds: Bedouin Stories (Abu-Lughod, 2008), and several others.Abu-Lughod aims to understand the mechanisms of social systems and the dynamics of gender and power beyond the way that liberal feminist theory appropriates women in Arab and Muslim societies.Through examining the details of their everyday lives, Abu-Lughod demonstrates various forms of women's resistance in order to emphasize how women's experiences are far more complex than suggested by the popular feminist discourse.
Like Abu-Lughod, Saba Mahmood (2005) criticizes the mainstream feminist understanding of agency in non-Western societies as being disconnected from its context and based on a universalized assumption of liberal thought "to be free from relations of subordination and, for women, from structures of male domination (p.10)."Mahmood contends that this problematic understanding of women's agency in relation to power dynamics is based on the "premise that where society is structured to serve male interests the result will be either a neglect, or a direct suppression of women's concerns (p.10)."Accordingly, such a conception of agency overlooks the mechanisms of power and broader political and socio-economic structures.Therefore, Mahmood argues that it is important to "understand agency not simply as a synonym for resistance to relations of domination, but as a capacity for action that specific relations of subordination create and enable (p.18)."This is crucial in analyzing women's agency in desert narratives, which is exerted not only through resistance to social and cultural norms but also in the numerous ways women "inhabit" them (p.15).
Another point that is crucial for comprehending the agency of Bedouin women is an understanding of the relationships between space, economy, and power.Despite the widespread perception of Bedouin women as passive and secluded in the desert space, their presence in the premodern public sphere was far more powerful, due to their effective participation in the market economy.It is true that there has always been gender-based segregation in Bedouin social life, yet Abu-Lughod argues that the changing economy of Bedouin society has had a greater impact on the women.She explains that women (along with men) contributed to the subsistence economy by extracting a livelihood from desert resources that later became exclusive to men.However, the shift to market reliance, where women contribute less to the economy, has "altered the extent to which men's traditional control over productive resources allows them to control women (Abu-Lughod, 1986, p. 72)." Similarly, El Saadi's (2012) work "Women and the Economy: Pre-oil Gulf States" challenges the representation of Bedouin women as being "helpless and secluded at all times and in all places" by emphasizing the significant contributions of women in the economic, social, and political life of pre-oil era Arabia (p.148).In the past, they were involved in many activities that brought them into direct contact with men in the public sphere.Eventually, women began to lose power and faced "unprecedented isolation and seclusion" with the change to a market-based economy after oil (Al-Sayegh, 2001, p. 29).Therefore, women's access to their spatial sphere (and eventually their rights) began to diminish with the changing economy. 4Understanding this relationship between gender, space, and the subsistence economy is fundamental to analyzing the way women maintain their agency in a desert narrative.
The desert narrative has been explored mainly by men, with one exception being the Egyptian author Miral al-Tahawy. 5Her female Bedouin protagonists, such as Fatima in The Tent (Al-Tahawy, 1998), Nada in Blue Aubergine (Al-Tahawy, 2002a), andHind in Gazelle Tracks (Al-Tahawy, 2002b), share a similar persona of a rebellious young girl living in a strict Bedouin society, whose rebellion leads to her tragic end.The emphasis of these narratives seems to perpetuate, rather than challenge, the stereotypical image of Bedouin women as passive, absent, and oppressed.Similar to the predominant feminist discourse with its restricted definition of agency, al-Tahawy's writings seek to criticize the patriarchal societies by depicting the miserable conditions of Bedouin women, including repression, confinement, and subjugation to the will of a single patriarch, but she overlooks the complexity of power structures in these societies.
However (Al-Fārān's, 2016), Ghawwāṣū al-aḥqāf [The desert divers] challenges that dominant discourse by redefining women's agency.She depicts not only how women resist domination but also how they conform to the social norms as a way of reinscribing alternative forms of power.She represents powerful women maintaining various types of autonomy in different power structures, and she highlights women's presence in public spaces with less rigid boundaries between the world of men and that of women.
Unlike the dominant discourse that focuses on the desert as a male-defined sphere, al-Fārān's counter-narrative reasserts women's presence in the public space through effective participation in the economic, social, and cultural spheres.While describing men engaging in war, traveling with trading caravans, and joining pearl-hunting trips at sea for months, the novel shows how women strive to secure a livelihood not only by performing household activities but also by caring for the sheep and camels, farming, harvesting grain, bringing water from wells, and performing many other essential tasks.Women's participation in subsistence economy jobs brings them into direct contact with men in the public sphere.For instance, members of the older generation, such as Um Jābr and Um Shāfī, are shown unrestrainedly in the public sphere along with men.The figure Um Jābr, a widow whose son is away on a diving trip, is portrayed as climbing up her palm trees to pollinate them while her male neighbor asks obligingly for help.Further, during the massive flood that ruins most of the homes and crops in al-ʿAqīq, Um Shāfī, along with her son, undertakes the responsibility to feed and shelter those who were greatly affected.During the rough times when hunger prevails, whether brought on by drought, flood, or wars, women contribute significantly and autonomously to the community.Naflah, one of the main female characters, manifests autonomy through her ability to reinscribe various forms of power.She is portrayed as a beautiful young woman who is admired by all who know her for her fairness, rebellious spirit, vivacity, and love of life.She expresses her joyful embrace of existence through dance; she even asks her mother not to bury her if she dies, explaining, "I hate narrow places, silence, and darkness; put me on top of an acacia tree, so I can see the sun and rain and hear you p. 262)."6 Naflah's dancing performance illustrates the cultural centrality of dancing in Bedouin society; it is practiced publicly and integrated into their everyday life.Through ceremonial dancing, men and women celebrate the success of crops yielded in harvesting season, and when someone is bitten by a snake, they sing and dance around him as a stimulant to help him stay awake.Most importantly, when a woman is divorced, her family, led by her father and brothers, welcomes her with rifles, singing, and dancing to cut off any rumors about her virtue, reassuring her that she is now back under their protection.For example, as Batlah is divorced, her brother kisses her on the forehead in front of the village and announces loudly, "If he has divorced you, we are your men who will never abandon you (p. 29)." Dancing symbolizes Naflah's agency, which starts to diminish after her marriage to ʿAmūsh, who was initially attracted to her by her inimitable dance performance but then prevents her from dancing after their marriage.Naflah's confinement (symbolized by her new suite in the house of her husband's family) undermines her earlier engagement with the public sphere, resulting in her subjugation and passivity.ʿAmūsh asks her not to dance at his brother's wedding, without justifying his order.Her moment of realization that her autonomy is threatened after marriage is shown as she exclaims angrily, "Do you know how long it has been since I last danced . . .? Ihaven't danced since I walked into your house p. 204)."Trying to calm her down, ʿAmūsh kindly offers to dance with her privately in their suite, "out of sight," but she pushes him away, uttering, "This is not dancing (p.204)!" Consistent with Abu-Lughod's analysis of Bedouin women, Naflah sees dancing as "a discourse of defiance" that becomes "an alternative space that is both creative and normatively valued as an act of autonomous expression (Abu-Lughod, 1986, p. 45)."Deprived of her most cherished means of self-expression, Naflah feels passive, objectified, and vulnerable as her spirit dims and her laughter is extinguished.She realizes that her disappointment is not simply because she is not allowed to dance but because her husband considers this "his right just as he considers her his property (Al-Fārān, 2016, p. 261)."7 Despite the love between them, Naflah cannot tolerate the invasive sense of being controlled and alienated.
Naflah decides to resist her husband's authority by disobeying him and dancing publicly in the ceremony for her cousin Batlah's divorce.Consequently, ʿAmūsh, struggling internally with his father's death and incited by his malicious aunt, hits his wife for the first time.From the description of Naflah's experience and interpretation of this incident, we learn that "his beating didn't hurt her; what hurts her is her sense of alienation from everything around her," and when he later tries to apologize, she stops him, saying, "This is not an act of a true man (Al-Fārān, 2016, p. 232)!" Determined to end her marriage, Naflah reflects on her relationship and recalls all her attempts to be a good wife, from the way she looks and behaves in front of her husband to the ways she cares for his family, whereas all her husband does is "continue training her for years not to be like the woman he chose to marry (p.240)."She can no longer resist his continuous attempts to seclude her and subvert her agency.
Adopting a different strategy to regain her agency, Naflah conforms to the social norms that are deeply rooted in the patriarchal practices of Bedouin society.When requesting a favor from someone, it is customary for a Bedouin man to remove his ghutrah (headgear) or ʿuqāl (headrope), which symbolizes manhood and pride, and toss it to the ground in front of the person.Following this masculine code, Naflah walks into the men's majlis (traditional meeting place), throws her veil down onto ʿAmūsh's lap, and asks him for a divorce in front of the other men, making a request he cannot now refuse.In a society where marriage is fundamental to defining women's worth, Naflah defies this social pressure, first when she rejects the many suitors who want her for her beauty, and later when she seeks divorce in an alienated marriage that cannot fulfil her autonomy.
Furjah, Naflah's neighbor, is another example of a powerful woman who expresses her autonomy explicitly and fearlessly.She does not hesitate to assert her individuality, despite the constant attempts by people around her to question her femininity because of her strong character and physique.Her mother-in-law even judges her when she bravely defends herself and beats the perverted man who persistently tries to harass the village girls.Challenging her assumption that "men are born stronger," Furjah objects, "Stronger?Can they bear children and give birth?If a man gets a thorn in his foot, he will hobble the whole day, while you [women] bleed a week every month and yet do all your work (Al-Fārān, 2016, p. 213)."Unlike Naflah, Furjah never compromises her sense of agency; for instance, she informs her family when her husband is planning to raid their neighborhood, even though her doing so might end her marriage.
Still, the author does not tend to idealize women's status in the desert as being fully independent or equal to men; on the contrary, she acknowledges the disadvantages women often face in a society that is highly patriarchal.Batlah's wedding to her beloved cousin is cancelled because of men's quarrels, while her very young sister is forced to marry the cousin instead, as if she were an interchangeable object.Batlah ends up in a loveless marriage, which leads to her divorce at the end of the novel, whereas her sister unexpectedly manages to find love and happiness in her new life (Al-Fārān, 2016, p. 70).Al-Fārān aims to move beyond the inadequate and simplistic binary of the male domination/female subordination of Bedouin women by showing multiple (yet unique and autonomous) women and how they resist in different ways, based on the complex power dynamics that shape their lives.
These forms of resistance against the strict norms of male domination resonate with Abu-Lughod's analysis of the complex power structure, as she concludes her essay "The Romance of Resistance: Tracing Transformations of Power through Bedouin Women:" We should learn to read in various local and everyday resistance the existence of a range of specific strategies and structures of power.Attention to the forms of resistance in particular societies can help us become critical of partial or reductionist theories of power.The problem has been that those of us who have sensed that there is something admirable about resistance have tended to look to it for hopeful confirmation of the failure-or partial failureof systems of oppression.Yet, it seems to me that we respect everyday resistance not just by arguing for the dignity or heroism of the resisters but by letting their practices teach us about complex interworkings of historically changing structures of power (Abu-Lughod, 1990, p. 53).
In conclusion, al-Fārān seeks to move beyond the simple binary of male domination/female subordination found in the predominant feminist discourse, which fails to adequately reflect the multiple and complex contexts-whether cultural, political, religious, or economic-that frame the lives of women.Her narrative is grounded in a multi-layered historical account of the region at the beginning of the twentieth century, narrating stories from different perspectives and points of view to understand the power dynamics.The desert space in the novel is dynamic and has its own internal conflicts and contradictions; it is a place that is neither romanticized as constituting an innocent mythological past nor perceived as a repressive, male-dominated space.

The modern Ṣaʿlūk in Al-Buṣayyiṣ' Ṭaʿm Al-dhiʾb [the taste of the Wolf]
Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] (2016) is the sophomore novel penned by ʿAbd Allah al-Buṣayyiṣ.The novelist's debut, Dhikrayāt ḍālla [Stray memories] (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2014), shed light on the conditions of the Bidūn (Kuwait's stateless population).Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] was well-received but was banned in Kuwait from 2016 to 2020; nevertheless, it went on to receive Kuwait's Discretionary and Encouraging Award for literary works in 2021.Al-Buṣayyiṣa Nabatī, or colloquial, poet-has written a lyrical novel that expands on the dimensions of the desert motif in contemporary Arabic literature.The author utilizes his knowledge of both desert culture and colloquial poetry to present the reader with a novel that explores the complex human struggle with the self, community, and nature, set in the desert of Saudi Arabia's Najd region.Additionally, it sheds light on a marginalized persona in the desert communities.
For the sake of clarity, the following analysis of the novel is divided into two main sections.The first section, "Dhībān," is a comprehensive summary of the novel and a textual analysis that explores the characteristics of the protagonist.The second part theorizes about what is dubbed "the modern Ṣaʿlūk" in contemporary Arabic literature.

Dhībān
The novel is divided into a short introduction and then three chapters narrating the events that took place over three days in the protagonist's life, starting from the moment he was expelled from his tribe.The short introduction reflects the circular narrative structure of the novel.The first chapter tells the story of the protagonist, Dhībān, an orphan and the only child of a heroic father who had been expelled from his tribe due to a conflict with the tribe's leadership that forced him to live under the protection of his wife's tribe.The name Dhībān originates from the word dhīb, meaning "wolf."It is a name born out of the tribal environment, and it expresses the strength, cunning, and courage of the person it is ascribed to; his mother shouts at him in the novel, "I want you to be a formidable wolf like your father (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016, p. 28)."However, Dhībān is not suited to his name; he is a sensitive person who hates fighting, loves to play the rabābah (a classical bowed instrument), composes poetry, and flirts with beautiful women near the stream, watching them bathe naked.These qualities are disparaged in the desert community.As such, Dhībān is perceived as a cowardly and weak man who is not respected by his peers in the tribe.In one instance, his mother shouts at him, "Your name is Kubān [coward]; Dhībān is a name for men, it is Kubāān. . .Kubāān (p. 29)."Al-Buṣayyiṣ affirms that his protagonist lacks all aspects of virility, for Dhībān has had three accidents that have caused a degree of impotence.After his mother's passing, Dhībān is forced to live his life on the margins, humiliated and sidelined by a tribe that has no respect for him but is still obligated to protect him.In fact, Dhībān is not a coward.Rather, he is a person searching for peace and safety in a community that only respects a man's virility and reputation.Dhībān communicates these beliefs to his mother as he ponders: Life is so full of possibilities, so why choose misery?Why do you all insist on putting boundaries and limiting life, for what is shame but actions that you all have chosen to compete over?Which one of you chooses death but does not reach it-all in the name of being superior to others?(p.56) Dhībān's life with the tribe comes to an end when he accidentally kills Mitʿib, a member of another tribe.This occurs when Dhībān is attempting to defend himself from being humiliated in front of Ghāliyah, the girl he loves, composes poetry for, and watches bathing naked in the stream.The death starts a war between the tribes that results in the deaths of two of Dhībān's cousins.While the two tribes try to reach an armistice, the wife of Dhībān's uncle-a woman who wants to expel Dhībān from the tribe-suggests a final fight between Dhībān and Mitʿib's brother Ḥumaydān to end the struggle.On the day of the fight, Dhībān soils himself in front of Ḥumaydān, who yells: You are now dead.You will live like the dead.You are not worthy for your blood to match that of my brother.I would rather spare you than kill you.You will live as a blight on your people, Kubāān (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016, p. 67).
Following the incident, Dhībān is forced to leave the tribe by crossing the desert to join a caravan heading to Kuwait.He leaves carrying nothing but shame and the memory of his humiliation and degradation.
The second chapter of the novel reflects his struggle with the wolf who tries to hunt him in the desert, leading him to hide in a burrow.The chapter consists of an extended dialogue between Dhībān and the wolf, or what seems to be a monologue by the protagonist that intertwines dreams and reality.This monologue reveals Dhībān's self-reflection, pushing him to confront his fears and concerns by facing dangers from the environment and its creatures.This culminates in a scene invoked in the title of the novel, in which Dhībān bites the wolf and tastes him.He eventually leaves the burrow when the sun rises.The chapter ends with Dhībān being haunted by the wolf and attempting to protect himself by climbing a tree and staying there for the night.Similar to the second chapter, the third chapter consists of an extended dialogue between Dhībān and the wolf, but the difference this time is that most of the dialogue is direct and takes the form of colloquial poetry.The novel ends with Dhībān killing the wolf, confidently arriving at a village, and inquiring about the next caravans heading to Kuwait.

The modern Ṣaʿlūk
In the recently published Stateless Literature of the Gulf: Culture, Politics and the Bidun in Kuwait, Alrabei (2022) provides a comprehensive reading of the Ṣaʿlūk (pl.Ṣaʿālīk) archetype within the wider context of Arabic desert literature; this makes the book an essential source for understanding the multiple dimensions of the Ṣaʿlūk archetype in Arabic literary traditions.Alrabei argues that most scholars have attempted to have their own translation of the term Ṣaʿālīk, including: "robber-poets" (Treadgold, 1975), "brigand-poets" (Stetkevych, 1986), "destitute poets" (Jones, 2011) and "outcasts" (Farrin, 2010).Yet, these translations fall short of capturing the connotative weight of the term and its cultural and political resonance in the Arabic literary tradition.(p.104) The literal translation of the term poses some limits in evoking the Ṣaʿlūk archetype in contemporary literature as well as understanding the status of Ṣaʿālīk within different literary contexts.However, the sources mentioned in the previous quote, which have enriched the readings of Ṣaʿālīk poetry, will be used in the following analysis of the novel.As stated in the introduction, most desert literature is associated with poetry; hence, it is crucial to refer to the implications of these studies on new readings of contemporary literature.
The broader definition of Ṣaʿālīk can be comprehended through ʿAbd al-Halim Hifni's elucidation of it as: a group that is distinct from the rest of society; having a sense of self-sufficiency sustained by an active engagement in marauding and thievery.The figure of the Su'luk is conventionally associated with the following connotative terms: a wolf "having wolfish tendencies" . . . .On the communal level, the poetry of the Sa'aiik valorizes the act of sa'laka, which works as a defiant force against the status quo and social immobility of the social tribal structure.Through the act of sa'laka, the poet gains his self-sufficiency and his sense of inner coherence by withdrawing into nature and outside of the impositions of the social structure.(as cited in Alrabei, 2022, p. 104) These detailed personal qualities and social experiences help identify and situate the Ṣaʿlūk character within his community.
Al-Buṣayyiṣ attempts to evoke the persona of the Ṣaʿlūk in a contemporary context to shed light on a group of people who are forgotten in the history of the desert and are continually marginalized, thereby adding a new dimension to the Ṣaʿlūk archetype.Dhībān, a poet whose name reflects wolfish tendencies, searches for peace in a community that values violence and loves shedding blood.He is a protagonist who tries to defy the communal consensus by searching for peace and tranquility in a society which considers this pursuit an act of cowardice.Dhībān is a character who is banned from exercising his will and agency by being thrown into the desert to face his fears and create a new world that suits him.This portrayal of Dhībān serves to conceive of a new figure in contemporary Arabic literature that might be dubbed the modern Ṣaʿlūk.This modern Ṣaʿlūk is the archetype of the marginalized figure in the history of the desert.It is an extension of rarely discussed people who are excommunicated due to what the desert community perceives as a failure in masculinity.
Hence, al-Buṣayyiṣ builds his novel around the story of the most notable Ṣaʿlūk poet in Arab history, al-Shanfarā.After attacking the Salaman tribe, al-Shanfarā was forced into the desert by his own tribe; this was attributed to his "being spurned by one of their women and to take revenge for the murder of his father by one of their men (Farrin, 2011, p. 25)."Despite the debated historical narratives about al-Shanfarā's life, "there can be no doubt about the exalted position within the canon of his desert ode which has earned the title Lamiyyat al-ʿArab (p.26)." 8 The ode serves as both an autobiography of the poet and a Ṣaʿālīk manifesto.The journey of Dhībān in Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] mirrors the journey of al-Shanfarā as depicted in his poem.The main difference lies in the fact that Dhībān is excommunicated due to his perceived lack of masculinity, which is taboo in a tribal society.
In her article "Archetype and Attribution in Early Arabic Poetry: Al-Shanfara and the Lamiyyat al-Arab," Suzanne Stetkevych (1986) approaches al-Shanfarā's ode from an anthropological perspective, through Ven Gennep's "rite of passage" paradigm.In her early close readings of Kītāb alaghānī, 9 Stetkevych argues that the heroic poems can be divided thematically into three sections: aṭlāl/naṣīb, raḥīl, and fakhar (p.364). 10These three stages mirror the tripartite structure formulation of Ven Gennep's rite of passage paradigm-separation, liminality, and aggregation-to achieve what she refers to as "a full heroic archetypal pattern (p.364)."However, based on the historical narrative of the Ṣaʿlūk, he goes through the first two stages only, and therefore: The su'luk poet can be termed a "passenger manque," one who has failed to complete the rite of passage to adulthood and incorporation into the tribe as a fully responsible member and who thus remains perpetually in the liminal or transitional phase.Likewise, I have argued that the typical su'luk poem can be interpreted as a "qasidah manque," one that consists of the nasib and rahil sections to the exclusion of the concluding section of tribal fakhr.(p.365) Thus, Stetkevych refers to the poet as a "liminal entity" who reintegrates into the liminal phase instead of the tribe.In light of the previous comprehensive summary of the novel, the following section examines Dhībān's journey by adopting Stetkevych's structural methodological approach in reading "Lamiyyat al-ʿArab" to explore the characteristics of the modern Ṣaʿlūk by comparing al-Shanfarā and Dhībān.

Separation
According to Victor Turner, separation is tied to the act of the individual/group detachment of "an earlier fixed point in the social structure, from a set of cultural conditions (a 'state'), or from both (as cited in Stetkevych, 1986, p. 365)."This is manifested in the novel's first chapter, which recounts Dhībān's separation from the tribe.When Dhībān is forcefully expelled from the tribe and must navigate the desert, the narrator describes the scene as a moment of salvation in which Dhībān is freed from all social constraints: He felt emancipated from the rules of life that they forced upon him and that did not suit him.What if he spent his life alone here?The desert might be a safe place if one were able to attend to its disposition.It might protect him from predators with its own predators.He felt in that solitude from other people a total peace and comfort from those who make life miserable.He should be more wary of people than of the dangers of the desert.(Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016, p. 73) Similarly, al-Shanfarā opens his poem declaring his separation from the tribe and withdrawing to the desert by articulating the same feelings that Dhībān harbors toward his tribe: 1. Raise, my brothers, the chests of your mounts, set them straight; as for me, I incline toward another tribe.2. The provisions have been readied, the night is moonlit, the mounts firmly saddled for your destinations.3.In the land there is, for the noble-hearted, a place remote from harm; for him who fears hatred, a refuge.
4. By your life, the earth does not constrain a man who travels by night, by free will or by force, if he has his wits about him.5.I have closer kin than you: a wolf, swift and sleek, a smooth and spotted leopard (smooth speckled snake), and a long-maned one-a hyena (Stetkevych, 1986, p. 378).
What distinguishes the two characters is that al-Shanfarā's statement reflects his confidence in his ability to adapt to a new life; he rejects his human kin by dwelling in the wilderness and replacing them with wild creatures (Stetkevych, 1986, p. 382).In contrast, Dhībān goes through an uncertain period of exploring the desert, during which he experiences tranquility and freedom by being away from people but is nevertheless full of concerns and doubts.

Liminality
According to Turner, the individual enters a betwixt liminal phase after the separation, in which "the characteristics of the ritual subject (the 'passenger') are ambiguous; he passes through a cultural realm that has few or none of the attributes of the past or coming state (as cited in Stetkevych, 1986, p. 365)."Turner elaborates further on the characteristics of liminality, arguing that it "is frequently likened to death, to being in the womb, to invisibility, to darkness, to bisexuality, to the wilderness (p.365)." In the second chapter of the novel, Dhībān enters the liminal phase as it depicts his confrontation with the wolf as a form of death.The desert is transformed from a place of tranquility into a liminal space, which the narrator describes through the eyes of Dhībān, "The desert revealed its grotesqueness to him.It became bare and mute, and everything in it was dying (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016, p. 28)." Dhībān is forced to hide in a burrow that barely fits his body, and he experiences thirst and hunger as he attempts to escape the hungry wolf in the desert.The wolf injures Dhībān, which leads him to the brink of death.During these critical moments, his anxieties escalate and send him into an ambiguous realm where he faces some of his past fears; additionally, he is haunted by doubts about his future.These moments are reflected in his long dialogue with the wolf during a period in which dreams and reality intermingle.Mary Douglas elaborates on the concept of danger in the liminal phase by stating: Danger lies in transitional states, simply because transition is neither in one state nor the next, it is undefinable.The person who must pass from one to another is himself in danger and emanates danger to others.(Turner, as cited in Stetkevych, 1986, p. 365) Dhībān overcomes his fears when he bites the wolf and tastes the wolf's fear in his victory.He experiences pride and starts to believe that he has finally lived up to the meaning of his name.
Similarly, al-Shanfarā enters the liminal desert and then articulates: 26.I go out early in the morning on scanty food, like the thin-hipped wolf led on from one waste to another, dust-colored.27.He goes out in the morning, famished, heading into the wind, light-footed, swooping down the ends of mountain paths, or loping.28.When his prey evades him from where he sought it, he calls out, and others like him, emaciated, return his call.29.Fleshless, white-faced, they are like bare arrows in the two hands of a maysir-player, clattering.30.Or like the agitated queen-bee, her swarm astir from the sticks that the honey-gatherer throws.31.Wide-mouthed, as if their jaws were splints of branches, they bare their teeth, ferocious.32.Then he clamored and they clamored on the broad and barren plain, as if they and he were wailing women, on the heights, bereaved.33.He shut his eyes, and they theirs; he imitated them, and they him; in their destitution he consoled them and they, destitute, consoled him (Stetkevych, 1986, p. 379).
Al-Shanfarā describes the hardship of desert life through the image of a hungry wolf wandering in the wilderness.In a scorching and windy desert, he endures hunger and thirst with a sense of satisfaction.Stetkevych (1986) argues that the wolf is a social animal that lives in a pack, presenting a "characteristically liminal ambiguity (p.383)."Al-Shanfarā beautifully portrays his life in the desert through the image of an animal that is social but at the same time antagonistic to humans, reflecting the characteristics of the Ṣaʿlūk (p.383).Stetkevych concludes her thoughts on this part of the poem by arguing that the "simile of man to wolf and wolf to man, is thus constructed on the same metaphorical principle established above: the feralization of the human and the personification (or socialization) of the feral (p.383)." To this end, it may be argued that Dhībān's character is more a "Ṣaʿlūk in the making."Stetkevych's (1986) analysis of the separation and liminality phases is reflected in the uncertain start of Dhībān's journey, yet each phase ends with a sense of certainty.In contrast, al-Shanfarā departs the tribe with pride and enters the phase of liminality believing that he is no less than a wolf; Stetkevych describes him as "exceeding, not falling short of, the reaggregate tribal male in endurance, fortitude, and resolve (p.383)."

Reaggregation
Turner argues that during reaggregation, the individual is expected to "behave in accordance with certain customary norms and ethical standards binding on incumbents of social position in a system of such positions (as cited in Stetkevych, 1986, p. 365)."However, the Ṣaʿlūk poet does not reintegrate into the tribe; instead, he reintegrates into the liminal phase to achieve inner peace and self-reliance.
The third chapter of Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The taste of the wolf] is a philosophical dialogue between Dhībān and the wolf during the time that Dhībān spends sitting in the tree befriending the wolf for a night, based on a truce.Most of the dialogue revolves around the notion of earning the meaning of the name (e.g., "Are you a wolf?") and discussing the process of overcoming Dhībān's existential fears.One of the most striking portions of the dialogue occurs before the truce ends, wherein the wolf asks: -Do you want to be a dog or a wolf?-Wolf -Wonderful.Be what you want to be, and not what they want you to be.This requires a little courage and a lot of carelessness.In order to be a wolf, you have to feel like a wolf who is in charge of his emotions.Emotion is the end-all and be-all.Dhībān, this world is but the truth of your emotions (Al-Buṣayyiṣ, 2016, p. 186).
The novel ends with Dhībān killing the wolf after their truce ends.Carrying the wolf's scalp on his shoulder with pride, he proceeds to a village to inquire about the next caravans heading to Kuwait.One of the villagers hosts him for an evening and asks him to recount his strange story with the wolf the next day.The novel ends with the chief and men of the village approaching Dhībān to welcome him, unaware of the fact that he has heard their whispered plans for restraining the man who killed the wolf.He once again senses the threat of death and starts to feel like he is transforming into a wolf.The moment they enter the room, he begins to howl like a wolf, leaving the novel open-ended.
Thus, the reintegration into the liminal phase is achieved and naturalized through the metaphorical transformation into a wolf.During this stage, he kills the wolf; this symbolizes killing the version of himself that surrendered to his tribe, and thereby he unleashes his true self as Dhībān.He howls, declaring that he will live life the way he desires, exercising his will and agency despite the tribe's customs and traditions.Similarly, al-Shanfarā ends his poem declaring in the last two verses: 67.The dust-colored does of the mountain goats roamed around me, as if they were maidens trailing long-trained gowns 68.They stood motionless around me in the twilight, as if I were, to the white-footed shegoats, a long-horned buck, heading toward the mountain slopes, unassailable (Stetkevych, 1986, p. 381) Al-Shanfarā's reintegration into the liminal phase is achieved and naturalized through the metaphorical transformation into another wild animal, the "she-goat," thereby blending in with the flock.The poet sustains his inner coherence and self-sufficiency by integrating into nature; in other words, he finds salvation again through the theme "feralization of the human" that we explored in the liminal phase through his portrayal of himself as a wolf.
In conclusion, al-Buṣayyiṣ evokes the persona of the Ṣaʿlūk poet and places it in a contemporary context to question the characteristics of the Ṣaʿlūk.This in turn enables readers to rethink the dominant culture of the desert.Through the comparison between al-Shanfarā and Dhībān, this section highlights the characteristics of the modern Ṣaʿlūk.The modern desert narrative is not about reproducing the heroic experiences found in the popular Arabic epics; rather, it is an expansion that sheds light on alienated personas that reflect the diversified desert community.The modern Ṣaʿlūk is any figure who counters the dominant tribal narrative that revolves around heroism and values a specific form of masculinity.

Conclusion
In The Desert in Modern Literature and Philosophy: Wasteland Aesthetics, Tynan (2020) states: The desert in the literary and philosophical imagination becomes a stage on which a new awareness -a new semiosis -of life becomes possible.The desert is where the very codes by which we understand life, death and the never-living are scrambled.(p.4) From the early Arabic desert literature, in which the desert is a romantic and mystical space that resists the encroachment of modernity, to more contemporary writing that engages with desert modernity, there has always been an evolving consciousness being reshaped by the environment.This article has explored the work of a new generation of Khaleeji authors who write about the desert while being apart from it.In an age of modernity, the desert becomes a space for writers who long for freedom and wish to revolt against all the social constraints (Albazei, 2013, p. 14).The desert modernity culture became, as Albazei puts it, "a culture of the largely socially repressed or rejected who find themselves motivated to rebel against the social and cultural hegemony (p.14)." This article has featured contemporary novels by a generation that tries to problematize the romanticization of the desert in modern Arabic literature.They do so by engaging with the gender dynamics of the desert as opposed to an escape from modernity.Al-Fārān's novel Ghawwāṣū alaḥqāf [The desert divers] moves beyond the simple portrayal of the desert space as constituting an innocent mythological past or as a repressive male-dominated space.She depicts the multiple and complex contexts that shape the lives of women and how they maintain agency in different power structures.Similarly, al-Buṣayyiṣ's novel Ṭaʿm al-dhiʾb [The Taste of the Wolf] employs the persona of the Ṣaʿlūk in a contemporary context to shed light on a group who have been historically forgotten and continually marginalized.By studying distinct female as well as male characters that challenge the traditional representation of the male-centered narrative, the current research opens the possibilities of exploring more marginalized identities who have been erased from the collective memory or never documented at all.It is a call to reconsider the male-centered narrative of desert culture that dominates Arabic desert literature.
Through our analysis of Al-Fārān's and al-Buṣayyiṣ's novels, we argue that the new generation of Khaleeji writers has surpassed the dominant narrative of a romanticized desert and topics that have been approached within this framework.The discussion of both works highlights how these young authors are contributing to the development of desert literature by creating a new consciousness that examines contemporary issues within the context of desert modernity-something that has been overlooked in early works of Arabic desert literature.They do so by representing the desert as an arena of struggle and discussing and dismantling taboos or sensitive topics related to gender and sexuality.In contrast to the older generation of Khaleeji writers, the works of these younger writers challenge the previous male-centered voices that utilize the desert as a setting to idealize the past in order to affirm specific cultural norms.Based on our analysis, we encourage scholars to explore works that expand our understanding of the desert in relation to rapidly changing societies.
The current study, focusing on Arabic literary works, demonstrates the need for additional studies in the field to address the lack of contemporary research on literature centered on desert communities.These emerging young voices succeeded in engaging with areas and themes that earlier works failed to address or that have been erased from the Arabic desert literary canon.The exploration of gender dynamics and societal alienation detailed in the analysis of both novels shows the need to consider the younger generation's views and engagement with the desert setting.To conclude, the novels chart new paths beyond the classical depictions of the desert in Arabic literature and persuade us to examine the new relationships and consciousness to the environment presented by this younger generation of writers.