Rania El Badry takes a closer look at the current state of Islamic fiction.
Want your children to discover the diversity and spirituality at the heart of Hajj? Have them check out The Green Dinosaur Umbrella by Amina Banawan.
Want them to understand the tribulations and peace of striving towards Allah? Consider introducing them to The Conference of the Birds by Alexis York Lumbard
What about everyoneโs favourite month, Ramadan? Oh, there are so many choices! There is Lumbardโs The Gift of Ramadan, Hena Khanโs Night of the Moon, and it seems even Curious George now has a Ramadan adventure.
The truth is, now more than ever, we seem to be going through a bit of an Islamic childrenโs book renaissance, with attention not only being given to quality Islamic stories being available but to also providing books that are aesthetically and literary pleasing. But the renaissance is not just about the publishing of childrenโs books; itโs part of a larger wave of minority representation taking the world by storm. Over the past decade YA, mainstream and literary fiction scenes have become peppered both with Muslim characters (like the Ms Marvel comics) or Muslim writers ( like Hisham Mattar, Khalid Hosseini, and Mohsin Hamid). And books are not the only medium seeing this rise.
But there is a question that needs to be asked with this rise in representation: while it is easy for childrenโs fiction writers to raise the flag of Islamic fiction, is that the same for YA, mainstream and literary fiction?
Childrenโs fiction naturally aligns itself with Islamic values because most of the time it falls into themes that connect to fitra. There is little room in itโwhether Islamic or otherwiseโto deal with matters of controversy, rather focusing on core human values and giving a more black and white understanding of morality. One could argue, Islamic values can already be seen in mainstream childrenโs literature. Popular book titles like The Velveteen Rabbit, The Lorax, and The Missing Piece Meets the Big O demonstrate values like altruism, environmentalism and self-worth. What can be Islamic in childrenโs fiction is more a matter of setting, relationships, symbols, figures, and terminology. Along with that, there is also a growing number of Muslim bloggersโlike Nailaโs Diary, Muslim Mommy Blog, and my personal favourite Notes from an Islamic School Librarianโproviding critique and reading guides of Childrenโs books being published, they believe that reading should be guided at this age, allowing children to develop their critical sensibilities.
But while childrenโs fiction is a fraternal twin to Islamic fiction, YA and Adult fiction are a much murkier territory, full of nuances, questions of morality, struggles of principles and values, and usually deal with characters confronted with the messy parts of life that often involve human failings. And if they donโt do any of that, then they often create tales that exist for a simple purpose: to entertain. YA and Adult fiction definitely have their value, in how they inform us about the world and help us grapple with it, however, is all fiction in these categories suitable for the Muslim reader, even if written by a Muslim?
This is when it becomes important to distinguish between โFiction written by Muslimsโ and โIslamic Fiction,โ and while the two are not mutually exclusive, they do not always overlap. Fiction written by Muslims is exactly that: fiction is written by someone who professes to be a Muslim. It may or may not contain Muslim characters and it may or may not aim to withhold Islamic values. Mohsin Hamid, for example, is a writer who identifies as Muslim but whose works would probably not fall under the label of Islamic Fiction: his works contain extramarital relations and Muslim characters who find themselves in contradiction with Islamic values. But the key component here is not really the โunIslamicโ events that take place in the book so much as how the characters feel about them and what the author voices about them.
This is in contrast with what is called Islamic fiction, which refers to โcreative, imaginative, non-preachy books written by Muslims and marketed primarily to Muslims. The content of these books will likely incorporate some religious content and themesโฆ[and] stories may also include modern, real-life situations and moral dilemmasโฆ.Islamic fiction cannot include harmful content: vulgar language, sexually explicit content, un-Islamic practices that are not identified as un-Islamic, or content that portrays Islam in a negative way. โ
That may have been a bit of a mouthful, but in the end, it boils down to this: is the work of art in any way in contradiction with Islamic values, or does it uphold them and regard them as valid? If the latter is true, then we have a work of Islamic fiction on our hands.
Similar to Islamic fiction, there is Christian fiction, fiction that is โwritten by novelists whose Christian worldview is woven into the fabric of the plot and character development.โ Bestsellers and classics like The Lord of the Rings and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe are considered among the rank of Christian fiction even though they are fantasies they contain a prevalence of Christian symbolism, allegories and values in the texts. Yet while Christian fiction is extremely popular even when following some similar regulations expected of Islamic fiction, such as the censorship of โgratuitous demonstration of sin,โ in the mainstream Islamic Fiction is far behind.
Why is that? One cannot be sure except with more research but it seems the problem is twofold.
Firstly, mainstream publishers would prefer to publish for Muslim writers trying to create a space of alignment in a post 9/11 world. Many popular Muslim writers who are given a voice either accept a form of conformity, or work towards creating the image of the acceptable Muslim, or portray conservative Muslims as fundamentalists and thus align themselves with stereotypes.
Secondly, the other side is the struggle that writers desiring to produce Islamic fiction face in trying to produce a complex work of art while trying to adhere to Muslim values. Muslim writers find themselves faced with so many questions:
Is the writing/reading of fiction even useful or halal?
How do you produce characters of complexity that portray human doubts and avoid perfect characters and moralizing themes, while sticking to Islamic values?
How do we navigate the writing of accurate creative work, especially when writing about actual events and historical figures?
Does the honesty of our work put us in the line of danger due to current politics?
How do we deal with the trust of the Muslim reader and the responsibility of portraying Islam correctly on the page without pandering to western expectations?
How do we create an all-around work of literary value, without falling into pitfalls that are usually associated with religious fiction?
All of these questions pose a true struggle to the Islamic fiction writer and can hinder the artistic process. However, the stalling of Islamic fiction, or Islamic media in general, is a matter of grave importance: with the scarcity of suitable fiction books, the up and coming generation are finding themselves more immersed in storytelling that is in direct contradiction to Islamic values, and this storytelling is unavoidable, spreading like wildfire in the current internet culture.
What is important is to help the emergence of Islamic fiction, especially with the current globalization and the increasing accessibility of fiction and the absence of censorship. Who are we expecting our new generations to be โentertainedโ by and learn from? They will be reading anyways, but are we giving them reading options that align with their faith? And given the quality of currently available readings, it is not just important that we produce Islamic Fiction but good Islamic fiction that will entertain, educate, inform, and ultimately help shape the minds of a future generation and their moral compass.
What steps can be taken to ensure this happens? What can writers do to get this done? And how can the general public contribute? Share your thoughts with the Bahath team in the comments.
Author: Rania El-Badry
