Qutuz's novel
Written by: Munther Qabbani
Number of pages: 399
Age after age, literature turns into an ever more complex machine that only the capable can wield and only those who are lurking can confront. This is because literary talent is of no avail to its possessor without artistic awareness and knowledge of matters of thought, philosophy, history, and culture in general. This places the writer and critic before a great responsibility in what they present to the public, and it is also what justifies the legitimacy of judging a text based on intentionality and premeditation.
From this window, we can look at the novel "Qutuz" by the Saudi doctor and novelist Munther Qabbani (Arab Scientific Publishers, 2014), which is the second part of the trilogy "Knights and Priests", a unique literary work that mixes and marries history, literature, philosophy, religion and science; formulated according to a special artistic vision, and with heroes known to ancient history, and others known to modern history, and thus it is the story of the search for the lost truth since the first human being appeared on this earth until today. - In this novel, Munther Qabbani follows the life journey of his hero (Murad Qutuz) between Saudi Arabia and America, whom he introduced to us in the first part of "Knights and Priests", as a doctor who searches for someone who shares his madness to answer many puzzling questions that have continued to occupy his mind since he knew himself as a child in the town of his ancestors (Atrar) until his arrival in America and his work there. And the reason that drives him to ask; He still sees himself living in two worlds: one ancient, belonging to the history of his ancestors in Bukhara, and the other modern, urban, which he lives as a doctor and scientist trying to discover more about the issue of death and life, and what lies between them of the world of spirit and matter, and thorny ideas about incarnation and revelation, and other philosophical problems that seem like a maze beyond which there is no answer.
Perhaps the following passage from the novel is more explanatory and interpretive of a riddle the author wanted to be difficult to explain: “Nothing will be unless it has been. Nothing will disappear unless it has disappeared. It is as if today came yesterday. It is as if yesterday will come tomorrow... This sentence, which was the last thing he heard from his previous life, kept coming to Murad Qutuz’s mind, along with the voice that seemed familiar to him. But this matter was only part of a series of riddles that besieged his mind and astonished his being...
A series of riddles kept growing with the days, and whenever he felt he was getting closer to solving one of them, another group would appear! But two riddles he felt were the most important at the moment; if he could decipher them, perhaps many things would be revealed to him: The first riddle was the one that happened in front of the Bukhara Citadel, when that dark, gelatinous creature besieged him, and Yasmi looked towards him... Did she see them at that moment?! The second thing was seeing himself as a child with his father on a visit to Uzbekistan, and that shrine located in the same place he found himself in after falling from the skyscraper and being transported in this strange state to this wondrous time, and those verses that were engraved on his wall: - "O questioner, where is the question from you... Are you walking in this world or in the world of imagination? You stayed up many nights and your eyes would not sleep... Searching for something from you that they would find out of reach... If the heart knows, why is it confused? And if the mind is a seeker, why is it a traveler from the truth?..." But what is the connection between these verses and the hero's dreams and vision of himself, perhaps his "embodiment" across two worlds separated in time and space? What is the thing that unites a rare "manuscript" and the verses that Murad recited at the shrine? And what did the strange man with the green turban prophesy in the presence of Genghis Khan? And what is the secret of Murad, the "fierce dog" who returned again, stronger than before?! All the secrets of this world and its strangeness are what the events of the novel will reveal - perhaps - in the third part of "Knights and Priests."