A Look Back: Hussein El Sayyed’s ‘We Had Days’
Recently, the American University of Beirut unearthed and archived three novels by the late Palestinian author Hussein Al-Sayyed, all three originally been published by Dar al-Hayat.
These newly archived novels are part of an indigenous Palestinian restoration project to archive histories of Palestinians, via the the novel, as a “letter” from the past to the future. The novels are digitized and available to the public via AUB libraries.
To accompany this review of Hussein Al-Sayyed’s We Had Days, we also talked to Amany Al-Sayyed about her late father and his novels. (“Amany Al-Sayyed on Her Father’s Lost—And Found—Novels.”)
By Nisreen Sinjab
As I started reading Hussein El Sayyed’s Kanat Lana Ayyam (كانت لنا ايام), it felt like just another scenario of unrequited love. Told from the perspective of a foreigner named Schneider, the novel tells of a passionate correspondence between two characters—Ghada and Nassif—and their unrequited love. Yet while this plot occupies more than half of the narrative, the novel’s key action lies in the first twenty-five pages and the last five. Here, El Sayyed masterfully frames his tragic love story within another tragic plot, involving the suicide of Schneider’s Palestinian friend Saeed, who is both an author and a clerk with the peace forces based in Jordan.
This latter story is first brought up as the novel opens, when Schneider recalls the circumstances surrounding his relocation to the conflict zone as an officer of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO), serving in Jordan, the Sinai Desert, and the occupied Palestinian territories. Through these interleaved stories, El Sayyed creates a palimpsest of memories. There are several layers to the epistolary format—beginning as a letter from Schneider to a friend, and later, letters between two lovers. Together, these stories frame a narrative that brings together past and present to explore themes of coexistence, loss, unrequited love, disillusionment, and broken communication.
But first, the story.
The reader is first introduced to Schneider, the narrator, in a bar in Palestine, where he is downing his fourth drink while writing a letter to a friend. In this letter, he details his circumstances, from the time of his arrival in Palestine, as well as his new role as a UNSTO officer. Schneider, with the stupor of a drunken man at the end of his tether, confesses to his friend Edward his regrets in leaving his homeland and his frustration over the futility of the international community’s attempts at mediation between the Jews and the Palestinians. To Schneider, none of the UNSTO investigations have ever stopped the Israeli transgressions, the bloodshed, the armed attacks, the retaliations from both parties, which El Sayyed writes is a “childish game Jews and Arabs are playing.”
Schneider, though resentful, explains to Edward that, if anything, the single goal he seems to have achieved in taking this job was overcoming his heartbreak. And indeed, he has succeeded in forgetting Jean, his ex-fiancé who had left him for a richer suitor.
From this starting point, El Sayyed frames a layered structure in which multiple stories grow and successively assume the spotlight. And yet Schneider’s pathos sets the tone for the ensuing narrative, offering the perfect framework for a yet more dramatic story.
When his commander commissions him to go to Jerusalem, which was under Israeli control, to collect the bodies of two Palestinian “infiltrators,” Schneider first hesitates. He suspects the Israelis’ intentions. To him, “these savage Jews are not to be trusted… they are capable of doing just anything.” Serving as undertaker for the Jews, as he puts it, disturbed Schneider. This is when he thought of taking Saeed, his Palestinian friend who had fled Palestine for Jordan with most of his family, leaving behind a father bleeding to death and a sister whose fate remained unknown.
Upon assuming his position, Schneider developed a friendship with Saeed, who would recount the hardships the Palestinians suffered because of Israelis. Driven by empathy and an intention to help, Schneider thought this commission would be an opportunity for Saeed to visit his homeland and seek his sister, while of course keeping Schneider company. Oblivious to his superior’s warning, Schneider finds a way to get accreditation for Saeed as an international journalist, and they both set off. Yet upon their arrival at the hotel, Saeed and Schneider part ways, as strict orders from the Israeli officer prohibit any journalists from accompanying Schneider on his mission.
Once he’s collected the two bodies, Schneider is relieved. On the one hand, he feels a surge of fleeting revenge, viewing the deaths of the Palestinian fighters as acts of retaliation and resistance against their oppressor. On the other, he is eager to return and fulfill his commission. Yet a feeling of unease settles in as Schneider thinks of Saeed, alone, back in the hotel. Soon, his worst fears are confirmed, and Schneider is greeted with the news of Saeed’s death the moment he steps into the lobby.
Here, El Sayyed begins to weave in the second layer of his tragic plot as we learn that, after Schneider’s departure, and as an act of hospitality, the hotel management sent Samar, a Palestinian girl, to “entertain” Saeed. He recognized Samar, the minute she entered, as his sister Samira. Unable to take in the shock, he committed suicide. Schneider’s commander promptly closed the case, listing Saeed as the third infiltrator Schneider had brought back from Jerusalem.
Schneider now sinks further into anguish as he describes the circumstances of this visit to Edward in a letter from the bar; El Sayyed’s palimpsest is heading off to the next layer as Schneider visits Saeed’s family, seeking atonement for Saeed’s death. Here the reader, much like Shahriar from A Thousand and One Nights, is eager to learn about the intensely passionate love story that Schneider uncovers when he meets Ghada, whose wedding to Saeed had been scheduled for the week following Saeed’s untimely death.
Like “a storm trapped in a devil’s urn,” Ghada sweeps up Schneider with her beauty and poise. His attempts at consolation are absurd. He knows, just as she does, that he was responsible for Saeed’s death. Yet Schneider’s guilt impels him to visit her again a month later. That is when Ghada shares a manuscript of her love story that Saeed had just finished writing before he left with Schneider for Jerusalem. Back in his hometown in the United States, Schneider had learned Arabic with an immigrant Arab tutor. In fact, his fluency in Arabic was one of the reasons he was offered a position with the UNSTO. Schneider thus calls for Edward’s full attention as he is about to unfold for him, and for us readers, the episodes of Ghada and Saeed’s love story.
From here on, Schneider’s character disappears, as the lovers Ghada and Saeed—or Nassif, as he calls himself in the manuscript—occupy the bulk of the longest tale in El Sayeed’s novel. This shift in perspective is accompanied by a transition from Schneider’s narration to forty-eight letters between the protagonists: Ghada and Nassif. Curiously, Saeed’s name also shifts as he adopts the role of the author. Here, El Sayyed chooses another narrator: not Schneider and not Saeed, but “Nassif.” Much like El Sayyed, Saeed, who is now the author, steps outside the self and beyond the Palestinian/Israeli pathos, into the shoes of “Nassif,” the subject in a fantastic love story. Or it might be that Saeed was using a pseudonym because of the need for discretion—an authorial choice that frames a conservative setting of his new tale. Keeping his real name, after all, might expose Saeed and Ghada if the manuscript were to fall into the wrong hands. Whatever the reason behind this shift in the character’s name, it engages the reader in the upcoming content of the lovers’ correspondence. We forget the earlier tragedies: Schneider’s despair, Saeed’s suicide, and the Palestinian struggle.
El Sayyed thus crafts a compelling new narrative that draws readers into a modern Romeo-and-Juliet tale of unrequited love. The author parallels the earlier tragedies of suicide, injustice, and brutality inflicted by the Israeli state in a tormented love story. The conflict transitions from the political to the personal, where intense emotions and desires fight for expression and fulfillment in a conservative environment which does not tolerate cross-religious marriage and love beyond societal conventions.
The tale opens with the author, Saeed, narrating the circumstances that brought Nassif and Ghada together. From their correspondence, we learn that Ghada was Nassif’s student. The subject he taught must fall under the humanities and languages, as there is reference to sharing drafts of stories both have written and there is mention of Nassif’s tendencies at “philosophizing.” Saeed recounts Nassif’s first encounter with Ghada when she handed him a draft of a short story she had written, asking for his feedback. Two months later, Ghada would make a surprise appearance at his apartment, a move daring for young women her age, let alone for any “decent” woman who fears damage to her reputation. In a fit of youthful impulse, Ghada confessed her fondness to Nassif. She had warned him in her first letter that she “will find a way into his future” and there she was, two months after their first meeting and correspondence, claiming the love and kiss she had come for. This is one of a very few times the lovers would meet.
Their tale unfolds through forty-eight letters, revealing Ghada’s passionate love and devotion to Nassif. She grapples with her emotions, seeks to avoid her parents’ questions and suitors, and strives to maintain her composure when Nassif does not reply to her letters. The anguish of their distance torments her, whether the physical separation during his trips to Beirut or the social barriers stemming from his financial instability, which prevent him from asking her parents for her hand. Additionally, the fact that he practices a different religion complicates their situation.
We also learn about Nassif’s struggle to keep pace with Ghada’s enthusiasm for details as she shares the intricacies of her daily life—where she went, who she met, the mean girls at school, her best friend’s views on love, and her discussions with her mother, cousin, and neighbor. While Nassif is captivated by her fervent self-expression, he struggles to match her energy due to his age and responsibilities. Consequently, he neglects to keep a journal over the summer, as they had both agreed, and finds it difficult to maintain regular correspondence, especially when he is away in Beirut or after a long day at work.
In fact, after 22 letters back and forth, we only receive Ghada’s letters. Nassif’s silence may be attributed to a car accident that hindered his ability to write back. Despite these challenges, their love endures for about two years, culminating in Ghada’s final letter, where she promised to keep “smiling in the face of a bleak future.”
With that, El Sayyed seals the ending of that fervent love story and zooms out to the initial framing narrative. Schneider continues his letter to Edward, recounting that a few months after Saeed’s death, he visited Ghada to return her manuscript. He describes finding Ghada lying in bed, eager to hear his feedback on her love story, which is interrupted by his gift of a pair of “cowboy trousers.” Ironically, Ghada has lost her leg, as she used her body to shield her little siblings from a hail of Israeli bombs. El Sayyed’s ending is as fast-paced as the beginning of the novel, as heart-wrenching as Saeed’s suicide, and even more ironic and tragic than the wait endured by the bereaved lovers. It resonates with the anticlimax found in every storyline.
Disappointment and frustration animate Schneider’s attempts at eluding his past and present; at finding meaning in international mediation; at his choices that attempt to fix the situation: taking the job, bringing Saeed to Jerusalem, then thinking a pair of “cowboy” jeans can restore Ghada to life, love, and dreams. El Sayyed’s ending neither redeems Schneider, nor Saeed, nor Ghada, nor the Palestinians’ Nakba, nor the international community’s mediation. Schneider is just another disenchanted orientalist who believed that sacrifice might be meaningful. In fact, El Sayyed encapsulates the heart of Kanat Lana Ayyam in the epigraph, which states:
“I do not demand that either one sacrifices… because one is more despicable than the other… and hence it has to end before the curse is passed on.”
This, along with the title, which loosely translates to We Had Days, underscores the theme of opportunities lost.
To me, an Arab living in Lebanon who well understands and identifies with the social context and the political milestones mentioned in the text, El Sayyed’s novel is not fiction. It is, rather, a morbid socio-political commentary on the futility of coexistence and communication, as reflected in its multilayered plots. Just as the coexistence of Jews and Palestinians appears impossible and attempts at reconciliation through dialogue and mediation prove futile, so too is the lovers’ correspondence thwarted by tradition and their coexistence doomed. Bridging perspectives can turn abusive, and seeking solace becomes an exercise in absurdity.
You can read We Had Days as a PDF here.
Nisreen Sinjab is an educator, theater director, author, and certified group and team coach. She teaches English literature, philosophy, drama, and a variety of humanities courses at both the university and high school levels. Nisreen has directed numerous plays for academic and cultural events. Her most recent production, The Person (2019), was performed at Rafic Hariri University. Additionally, she has directed over eleven high school plays, with her latest being an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (2023), performed at The International School of Choueifat (SABIS-Egypt). Nisreen is also an author, contributing to the anthology Arab Women Voice New Realities by Turning Point Publishers (2017). She has written multiple high school textbooks, published by Heritage Publishers (2007/2009), and had her poetry featured in The National Anthology of Poetry (1994-1995).