A review by Jean Jabbour, for Al Modon, April 13, 2025
In her newly released novel “May vanishes” (Dar Al Adab), Najwa Barakat continues her exploration of existential questions, memory, and internal conflict—recurring themes in her previous works, which often spotlight characters grappling with intense crises. However, unlike her earlier novels, which sometimes carried clearer social or political undertones, May vanishes is more ambiguous and enigmatic. Its central character is an 84-year-old woman suffering from intermittent dementia, and the narrated events, as the author states, are “fragments of old, erased memories that suddenly resurfaced” (p. 67), emerging from a perforated memory, for “over time, memory becomes a riddled basket that retains very little” (p. 53).
Characters and Events Between Absence and Presence
From this perforated memory emerge blurred faces and disjointed events that the reader struggles to decode and connect. The author handles characters and events selectively and in a fragmented temporal manner. Yet, as the narrative progresses, the picture gradually becomes clearer, raising philosophical and psychological questions about absence, identity, and fate.
Faces are sketched with quick strokes and hold varying degrees of importance. Most lack psychological depth, yet they are crucial in shaping the image of May and retelling her story from multiple angles. Each character serves as a mirror reflecting an aspect of May’s life, whether through direct influence or perspective. May recalls her grandmother, father, and mother—but their names are absent. Aunts Nabihah, Zakia, and Widad appear as a traditional female chorus, releasing their repression through a passion for wrestling matches. Of her nameless husband, what she remembers most are his beautiful feet, while the lover occupies a large space—not merely a romantic element but a mirror to May’s internal struggle, revealing her contradictions, her desire for attachment and detachment, and her need for love mixed with fear of it.
In this chaotic tableau, fleeting faces pass by like a fast reel: the wrestler brothers Saadeh and their companions Brans Komaly, Danny Lynch, and Kovach. There is also Dahech, famed in the 1940s and 50s as a superhuman figure. These characters emerge from the depths of memory, gradually revealing May’s past and her complex relationships, including her internal conflicts and the social pressures she endured.
As for present-day characters, they are perhaps reduced to Yusuf the Syrian building caretaker, Shamili the Sri Lankan housekeeper, and the cat May finally names “Frida.” Yusuf is not just a friend or narrator—he represents the reader, seeking to understand May as we do. Through him, the novel’s central questions are posed. Shamili may be the only source of tenderness in the novel. Meanwhile, the cat is not merely a pet but a companion sharing May’s loneliness and isolation.
This selectiveness extends to the events, which are not given equal narrative weight. May’s marriage is mentioned fleetingly, as a marginal detail, and nothing is said of the twins’ birth: “After I left (the asylum), he proposed. I married him… my belly swelled and I gave birth while I still hadn’t recovered my mind, which I had left God knows where, and then forgot…” (p. 190). In contrast, her abortion after the affair with the lover is given significant narrative attention. This imbalance is not arbitrary—it reveals how May views her life. What is imposed on her fades from memory, while what she chooses herself remains vividly present.
All this renders May a mysterious character, torn between escape and self-discovery, trapped between societal constraints and her inner voice. She is no conventional heroine but a rebellious figure against her reality—yet still imprisoned by it. Hence her nihilistic self-assessment: “I don’t believe in angels, I don’t believe in hell, and I can almost say I don’t believe in anything. My greatest wish is to live as a beet or a dog” (p. 56).
A Social Novel?
While May vanishes delves into existential and individual concerns, it also highlights the transformations in Lebanese society and reflects a fractured social reality. The story unfolds in a country suffering continuous collapse: “I don’t think anyone else on the entire planet has lived through what we’ve experienced here in the past five years” (p. 90). Here, May’s vision is clear as she speaks about the economic collapse, the October 17 revolution, and the port explosion. She recalls how people took to the streets chanting “All of them means all of them,” how savings vanished from banks, and how she herself went to the bank and, in protest, struck the manager’s desk with her cane. She devotes moving pages to the August 4 blast, describing how hundreds of young men and women rushed to sweep streets strewn with glass and rubble. She concludes: “The long-handled broom in their hands became the symbol of the era, and sweeping out everyone became not just a demand but a necessity for survival. We are orphaned citizens, with no state to care for us and no institutions” (p. 100). Against this backdrop, the issues of migration and disorientation also arise, as people struggle to find a place for themselves in their homeland. May’s two migrant children represent a generation forced to emigrate due to the homeland’s dead-end prospects, making their absent presence in the novel a testimony to society’s failure to support its people, and to the struggles that turn the nation into a place of alienation instead of security and belonging.
In sum, May vanishes offers a sharp social reading of the Lebanese situation, with its characters navigating a landscape saturated with crises that leave no room for stability. The novel becomes a literary documentation of a harsh historical moment.
A Feminist Novel?
May vanishes is not necessarily a “traditional feminist” novel in the sense of overt feminist advocacy, but it invites feminist reflection by addressing themes such as identity, the body, authority, family, freedom, and gender relations. Feminist markers are visible in the rejection of direct and indirect patriarchal authority, the deconstruction of the idealized woman in Eastern society, the emphasis on marginalization and psychological pressure experienced by women, and the highlighting of presence/absence as a symbol of a woman’s struggle with an imposed existence. Thus, the novel does not wave feminist slogans but embodies feminine anxiety, rebellion, and fragmentation within a complex Eastern society. It opens a space for readers to rethink feminism not merely as ideology but as a profound existential and intellectual experience.
Narrative Techniques
Najwa Barakat’s narrative style in May vanishes showcases several technical features that reflect her storytelling mastery, making the novel a rich and complex literary experience. She uses fragmented narration, where the story does not unfold linearly but shifts between intertwined times and events, mirroring May’s confusion and disorientation. Events are presented from multiple perspectives, as if the reader is piecing together a puzzle to form the full picture.
This is enhanced by polyphony, as the narrative is not limited to May’s voice but incorporates those of others (the lover, Yusuf…). This creates ambiguity and open interpretation; the novel does not offer direct answers but leaves many questions unresolved, encouraging mental engagement and reflection.
Additionally, Barakat’s language is dense and free of filler. Her descriptions rely on quick, cinematic scenes—flashes where images and memories overlap in a rapid, intense stream.
Within this play of ambiguity and clarity, the author employs a “mirror game” between “May” in the first part and “she” in the second, with their connection initially unclear but later revealing a dual identity and the core question of selfhood that drives the novel.
May vanishes is not a traditional novel with clear events and a defined ending—it is a complex, open-ended work that plays uniquely with the boundaries between reality and imagination. It is a provocative and intellectually challenging piece, written in a compact style that makes the novel more of a psychological and contemplative experience than a straightforward tale. Through this technique, the author makes us partners in the quest for May’s truth, which ultimately transcends individual character and becomes a symbol of a society suffering from absence, psychological alienation, and cultural dislocation. This is what makes the novel a deeply existential work.
