Growth stops | Novel

"When he arrived at the Corniche, the rain began to fall. It was in the form of feathery showers falling lightly with the spray rising from the waves, and the wind carried the dreamy mixture to collide with the walls protected by gray marble of the North Court building, as it stood facing the Mediterranean. The sun had not yet set, but had begun to shine hundreds of times within the raindrops. This scene seemed wonderful to him, as if he was recalling the stories of his childhood from his father’s mouth." In his novel (Arrested Growth), writer Shukri Al-Midi Aji relies on confused memory in his narration, hesitating between the past and the continuous present. The young man meets the elderly man, who worked for several years as a soldier, and tells him scattered details about his life and his relationship with the city and its people, and perhaps to confess to the actions he committed in order to protect the existing regime and its repressive policies. The scattered memory mixes with the young man’s desire to understand the history and composition of the country and its people, and his tireless attempt to express himself by drawing artistic paintings that combine works by artists from different eras. The novel reveals the human condition oscillating between good and evil and explores dark depths in the soul that we always try to control and whose existence we often deny. It is the story of a society that tries to forget its memory, but it returns in the form of nightmares that consume its absurd present.