Abstract:This paper analyzes Frankenstein in Baghdad, the winner of the 2014 International Arabic Fiction Prize by Iraqi novelist Ahmed Saadawi. I argue that by borrowing the story of Mary Shelley’s monster in Frankenstein, Saadawi manages to pinpoint the roots of the terrorism that has plagued Iraq since the American occupation. Terrorism emanates from fear. Fear is the monster that has been unleashed by the collapse of central authority which resulted in what Judith Butler has called ‘a precarious life’ in which sud… Show more
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.