ABSTRACT
This article argues that Jabra Ibrahim Jabra’s In Search of Walid Masoud parallels
Shakespeare’s Hamlet by exploring various themes and motifs such as the ghost, the
gravedigger, Ophelia’s suicide, adultery, chastity, and madness. Through these themes
and motifs, Jabra weaves a narrative that simultaneously recalls and reinvents
Shakespeare’s classic play in a contemporary, politically-charged context. This article
shows that Jabra utilizes Hamlet as a pivotal reference to represent the main concerns
of his Palestinian people from a new and distinctive literary perspective. This is explicit
in Jabra’s representation of revenge, in particular. In Hamlet, Shakespeare explores the
theme of a son’s revenge for his father. Jabra, on the other hand, structures In Search
of Walid Masoud around the revenge of a father for his son, which makes the revenge
at the heart of the novel not personal but rather collective (the father’s revenge for his
motherland/Palestine). This demonstrates Jabra’s proclivity to render the national plight
of Palestinian people global and permit the Palestinian struggle to be perceived on a
larger scale.

Title

Cogent Arts & Humanities

Publisher

Taylor & francis online

Publisher Country

United Kingdom

Indexing

Scopus

Impact Factor

None

Publication Type

Online only

Volume

--

Year

2024

Pages

12