Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Distant Train

Distant Train

Aboul-Ela, Hosam M.
Abdel Meguid, Ibrahim

Hardcover

Series: Middle East Literature in Translation

Fiction Anthologies

Publisher Price: $22.95

ISBN10: 0815608594
ISBN13: 9780815608592
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Published: Apr 26 2007
Pages: 218
Weight: 1.02
Height: 0.78 Width: 6.60 Depth: 9.20
Language: English

While the fading autumn sun sped toward the horizon, the young boys headed home--they were not used to trying to see at night without the moon's glow. So begins this unconventional, hauntingly mythic novel. In the tradition of magical realism, author Abdel Meguid crafts a tale steeped in symbolism. Writing in a shimmering lyrical style, he brings alive the dreams, customs, and everyday concerns of people living in historic obscurity on the fringe of the glitzy petro-dollar kingdoms of the Middle East.

The tale begins on a worksite in Egypt's western desert. Here, in the middle of nowhere, railway men and locals wait in hope for the annual return of a distant train. When last it came, this vehicle brought with it foreigners, soldiers, and economic opportunity; then it stopped. Each of Abdel Meguid's characters is allegorical in nature. Each part of the novel is framed by memory and the way remembrance takes shape and affects the characters. The story's main characters are time and place. Yet its dramatic thrust is the ways in which place gives rise to history through the passage of time and the rise and fall of settlement. Distant Train reaffirms Abdel Meguid's status as an imaginative and distinct voice in the field of narrative literature and the time-honored arena of storytelling.

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