قصة الكتاب :
Season of Migration to the North is a post-colonial Arabic novel by Sudanese author Tayeb Salih. It was written in Arabic and published in 1966 in the Beirut journal Hiwar under the title Mawsim al-Hijra ila al-Shamal. The novel describes the impact of British colonialism on African societies in general and Sudanese culture in particular. It also takes a look at the challenges faced by modern Sudan as a result of the brutal forces of colonialism that shaped it. The English translation of the book was published by Denys Johnson-Davis in 1969. It has been described as one of the six great novels in Arabic literature. In 2001, it was selected as the most important Arab novel of the twentieth century. The novel has been translated into more than twenty languages and is regarded as a turning point in the development of post-colonial narratives that helped focus on the encounter between the East and the West.

\r\nThe manner in which the story has been laid out makes it impossible for a reader, who reads it for the first time, to decipher much about the characters or their past. It gives the reader a sense of being lost in a strange country that has to be discovered and understood as the clues unfold. The story should be read in light of the shifting cultural and political landscape of Sudan since 1899, when the British took control. The story tracks, through the experiences of its two main characters i.e. the unnamed narrator and Mustafa Sa’eed, two generations of Sudanese elite under the British rule and the early days of self-governance. It is told in spurts of narration with much of the political background deliberately omitted, a style that can leave an unprepared reader frustrated. As the story unfolds, we see that both the narrator and Sa’eed are two sides of the same coin. Sa’eed has abused the colonial system and has in turn been abused by it. He has returned to Sudan bearing with him the destruction that he has come to embody. The narrator, on the other hand, is representative of the model Sudanese citizen and an embodiment of the “new Sudan”. The story eventually reveals how the model represented by the narrator is a mirage and unable to exert any meaningful influence on the progress of the Sudanese people or make an impact on their lives. It ends with the unfolding of Mustafa Sa’eed’s dark destiny. Sexual violence is described in gruesome detail and serves as a metaphor for the clash between the colonizers and the cultures they seek to dominate and ultimately destroy.

\r\nOften taught in culture studies classes, Season of Migration to the North is definitely a famous book in the Arab world. For a brief period of time from 1989, the novel was banned in Sudan because of its graphic imagery. Today the book is freely available in Sudan. It has been adapted into a play and has won awards for its lead’s performance at the 1993 Acco Festival of Alternative Israeli Theatre. \r\n