The Moroccan critic Yahya Ben Walid continues to delve into “Post-Prison Writings” in Morocco, which explores the experience of political imprisonment, specifically focusing on the wounds inflicted on Moroccan women. He reveals the commonalities and differences between the writings of men and women in this field, emphasizing the unique nature of prison writing that sets it apart from other writings by Moroccan women.
Considering the “surge of post-prison writings in Morocco,” which was extensively discussed in a previous study published in the magazine “Al-Kalima” (Issue 15, March 2008), it is not surprising that women enter the sphere of these writings. This is all within the perspective that led them, under the influence of the “burden of memory,” to merge writing and confrontation, taking on explicit dimensions as seen in the work of Fatna El Bouih, “The Discourse of Darkness,” published by the Moroccan Al-Fanek Publishing House in 2001. This remains her only work so far, alongside her collaborative work with Youssef Madad, “Atlas of Testimonies from Behind the Curtain” (2006). It is worth noting that her contributions and responses are few, but this work is one of the first on the path of the aforementioned surge, especially regarding the “testimonial front” through which the author preferred to convey her “message” within a country that, since the early 1990s, has been restless and officially seeking to turn the page on its “dark past” in terms of human rights. This page cannot be turned without examining its broad lines and intricate details, using various forms, notably through writing that possesses numerous expressive and representational qualities. Here, the focus is on post-prison writing(s) in which the authors, to varying degrees, expose the horrendous torture and humiliation they endured throughout the rising seventies.
One distinguishing feature of Fatna El Bouih’s work is that it is written from an experiential standpoint rather than from a distance, meaning it emanates from what leaked into the “memory” (both future-oriented and past-oriented) of the “words-things” resulting from years of “harsh residence” in prison and the associated feelings and perceptions at the existential and conceptual levels. It is not surprising that experiential writing, characterized by its immediate self-presence, differs from distanced writing pursued by professional writers. While the latter form of writing is not without importance, especially in terms of style and parallel historical aspects, it does not impose itself with the same force and urgency on historians, public opinion, and human rights activists. Regardless of the degree of “fullness” starting from individual words in the writings of “distance,” they do not reach the levels of “haunting” found in experiential writings. Ultimately, there is a bond between writing derived from the prison’s bleeding and writing derived from the ink’s ode. There is also a bond between writing from within the “fracture” and the attempt to write the fracture. However, what preceded does not imply any form of “oppressive hierarchy” in which the value of writing/experience outweighs the value of writing/distance.
And writing has remained, for the most part, monopolized by men, as if it were an injunction not to teach women how to write, which is an old/new advice, in addition to not deviating from what some call “colonial jurisprudence.” The implications of this monopoly multiply even more in the repressive context of patriarchy and oppressive male thinking, especially when this thinking is framed within a broader context of state and societal violence (patriarchy, in this case). Even in moments of erasing masculinity, or even attempting to eradicate it, as in the case of descending into the hell of prisons, men continue to dominate the writing of “detention” chapters and scenes of “humiliation.” This occurs despite the fact that women, in turn, throw their “condition” into the heat of confrontation, affirming Scheherazade’s advice to her female descendants to strengthen the legitimacy of writing with feminine perspectives in the context of the dream of building a “secular state” that cannot solely rely on masculinity. At this level, women suffer from a “double repression”: the repression of masculinity and the repression of prison.
In light of what has been mentioned, it does not seem incongruous for Fatna El Bouih to carve out the phrase “the wound of detention with the letter Taa Marbuta” on the ground of writing-resistance, indicating the contrasting and devastating impact of detention on women or “the femininity nun.” The phrase “Third World women,” silenced by the famous Indian critic and postcolonial theorist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, in the perspective of the layers of oppression that affect them, brings to mind the perpetuation of “the colonial phenomenon.” This is confirmed by the “labyrinths of prisons,” which are no less dangerous than the tunnels of colonization, especially when the “angry executioner” transforms into a “rapist torturer,” especially in terms of his “language” which transforms, in the case of women, into a “penis” lurking within the body’s pulses or flows. In such a contrasting context, or what some have referred to as “sadistic slippage,” the latter can only curl up like a smooth hedgehog inside the prison tunnel that is subject to repression from all sides, in order to preserve the invisible consolidation and implantation.
Fatna El Bouih had the honor of throwing the stone into that stagnant and stifling pond that many men and women know well. Very few Moroccan women of our time have taken the initiative, or rather dared, to write on the subject or sought help from other writers, despite their large number and the fact that what happened to them has not been fully written, even if only in summary form, not elaborately or comprehensively, nor in detail. Fatna El Bouih insisted, to some extent, on “exploding the prison’s silence,” all within the framework of monitoring and, through the “filter of memory,” what happened to her during the period of detention in what the radical left literature referred to as the “Second Group.” This group included six political detainees in their prime: Latifa Jbabdi, Maria Zouini, Khadija Bakhari, Bouda Enkia, Widad El Bouab, and Fatna El Bouih. This group followed the first political group, which included Fatima Akach and Rabiaa Lafdouj, alongside the famous detainee Saidia Manbahi (1952-1977), who passed away in one of the hospitals in Casablanca as a result of a historic strike (Group 139) that was launched to enforce the rights of political detainees, specifically on December 11, 1977. The meaning of the aforementioned is that Fatna El Bouih’s “choice” falls within the framework of the “leftist” experience, and her work falls under the “civil perspective,” distinguishing it from the “military perspective” reflected in “Tazmamart texts.”
I have been arrested in Rabat, after studying sociology at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities. This “specialization” was pursued by many and was closely associated with “leftist dreams.” In addition, the influence of certain names in this field, such as Fatima Mernissi, a sociologist who would later become a university professor, also played a role in her frequent visits to prison, showing solidarity. The owner of “The Talk of Darkness” was arrested due to her previous involvement in the secret organization “National Union of Students” since she was a student at one of the high schools in Casablanca. This affiliation was also the reason behind the arrest of Tahar Ben Jelloun, as depicted in his book “This Blinding Absence of Light” (2004). Furthermore, Fatna El Bouih’s work, within the same civil perspective, differs from the works created by individuals associated with the literary and intellectual institution (and the dominant ideological understanding of that time), such as Abd al-Qadir al-Shawi, Abd al-Latif al-Labbi, and Abdullah Zrirka.
It doesn’t seem incongruous for the work to rely on the “testimonial” aspect previously mentioned, and according to statistics provided by Jafar Aqil, a researcher interested in prison writings in Morocco, the majority of these writings, exceeding sixty percent, fall into this category. We don’t need to delve into the differences between testimonies and other forms adopted in prison writings here, as each form has its own tools, nature, and function. The testimony seems closer in terms of its fusion of confession and condemnation, within a kind of “history,” a close-up look at a phase of the fiery and crucial seventies in Morocco’s recent political history. During that phase, entire political groups and ideological currents rushed to participate in its uproar and clamor. The work also does not deviate from what contemporary critics call the “narrative – framework” that accompanies most prison writings. This narrative stretches between the moment of arrest, the period of imprisonment, and the aftermath of imprisonment. At this level, there is often a focus on the period of arrest compared to the event of arrest itself, which is no more than a fleeting moment, alongside what comes after imprisonment, which is often ignored in post-prison writings, except in a few cases like Abdul Fattah Fakihani and Jawad Mididish.
As for the arrest or the “great incident,” as some call it, Fatna El Bouih was arrested following the customary arrest procedure, but in a surprising manner and broad daylight. It happened after she had taken a morning bath as part of her daily routine. She says, “It was around three in the afternoon when I knocked on the door of my friend’s house in the Al-Muhit neighborhood. I was surprised to see the door open quickly, and a stranger’s hand forcefully pulled me inside. My friend, who was accompanying me, escaped when he realized that the house was occupied and someone was chasing him. He ran like an arrow, and then returned after his clothes were torn… They were furious, two men dressed in civilian attire, but armed. One of them tightened his weapon around his waist, while the other pointed his weapon at my face twice.” As summarized by the author herself, “This was the beginning of the kidnapping story that would last for five years, and some of its chapters resemble the tales of One Thousand and One Nights… (pages 10-11).”
Regarding the trial, Fatima Al-Bayeh spent three years awaiting judgment, starting with seven months in the infamous Darb Moulay Cherif prison. Going to the trial, unbeknownst to the group, felt like going to execution or hanging. She describes the scene, saying, “They were swiftly taken by a car from the prison to the trial, surrounded by police officers who escorted them to a large room… They were ordered to sit at a separate table in a long row of tables, with no one else present: no lawyers or court clerks. It seemed as if they were being led to execution or hanging. Even at this stage, they were not informed about anything. Their affairs were shrouded in secrecy and concealment…” (p. 56).
Counting the prisons where Al-Bayeh spent years of detention is not a difficult task. It began with Darb Moulay Cherif, where the tragedy of her imprisonment unfolded. That dreadful prison where there was no distinction between day and night, and where she contracted various diseases that usually accompany the remaining years of life. She managed to recognize the prison by the voice of the most infamous executioner at the time, Qaddur Al-Yusufi, alongside the brutal executioners and notorious figures in the history of Moroccan prisons. She says, “I learned to recognize them by their smells and the shapes of their shoes. Even the finger marks left by their slaps, when I put my hand to my face to feel them and record the humiliation, I could distinguish Yusufi’s hand from Abdul Latif’s, or the hand of Jammal, Ayoubi, and others…” (p. 18). Then comes the role of the “Aghbila” prison in Casablanca, where she was taken the day after Saida Al-Munabi’s martyrdom, as well as Sidi Said prison in Meknes, Lalla Aicha prison in Rabat, the central prison in Kenitra, and Dar Al-Arifah in Sidi Qasim. It is certain that these prisons vary, and speaking about them cannot deviate from the “suffering” according to the term used by Al-Bayeh, whether in “Hadeeth al-Atmah” (Prison Discourse) or in her open testimonies. Thus, the Meknes prison, with its cells, resembled a five-star hotel, as stated by Latifa Al-Jabbabdi in her testimony included in the book (p. 132). The prison discourse is filled with the vocabulary that dominates most post-prison writings, the vocabulary that falls within what is known as the “prison dictionary.” This dictionary is dominated, in “Hadeeth al-Atmah,” by words or “things” like cell, bar, toilet, plane, inmates, etc. In addition to what the self undertakes, amidst these terms, in terms of exercise, mockery, reading, and organizing the cell… all within the context of what can be called time management inside the prison and thus self-preservation from “internal destruction.”
Even though the work, as mentioned earlier, was written after its author’s release from prison, it does not concern itself with what comes after prison, except for what appears to be familiar in post-prison writings, indicating the illness the author suffered from after leaving. She says, “When I left the prison, I was thin and pale, and I was psychologically shattered. The seven months I spent in Darb Moulay Cherif caused this deterioration in my health and mental state, and the prison only deepened these conditions: acute rheumatism with every attack…” (pp. 36-37). However, the author’s responses and testimony indicate that she has no regrets about the experience and that she was not deceived… She engaged in political work from a position of choice and conviction.
Even if we do not wish to engage in theoretical discussions about “women’s literature” and “women’s writing,” and thus the difference between the two terms, it is worth noting that Fatima Al-Bayeh’s work is an obvious feminist achievement, which is evident, first and foremost, in the language that forms the foundation of her writing. Consequently, the work is dominated, at the level of its significant centers and their semantic circulation, by what usually does not deviate from the “world of women.” It is not surprising, then, that the memories leap to mind, including incidents of sexual harassment and threats of rape, along with other “permissible” forms that surpassed the tendency of “information” toward the insistence on shifting the “position” that women were keen on maintaining amidst the prison’s deceit. However, the prison that accommodated Fatima Al-Bayeh, alongside her fellow political detainees, also housed public offenders, deviants, and even murderers, albeit in exceptional cases that required their referral to psychiatrists, similar to the case of the young man who spent a night being kicked and beaten until he bled because he claimed to be a “prophet” (p. 123). Nevertheless, the former female detainees were not hardened criminals who intensified the prison’s bitterness like the ruthless criminals who, in turn, govern prisons and threaten vulnerable prisoners. They represent the other face of the “prison society,” as referred to in writings that address the topic of prisons.
The author states that she was not alone, but in light of the testimony she seeks to convey, she focuses solely on herself and from a perspective that strives to preserve her authentic femininity within the jungle of the prison, which is dominated, in addition to detention, by a male-dominated language that is oppressive, procedural, and directly suppressive, and even prior to that, it is characterized by male chauvinism no less oppressive. This trend was evident from the moment of arrest: “The abductors were men: they occupied my colleague Khadija’s house” (p. 11). She explains, “I will never forget the taste of those nights mixed with the smoke of their cigarettes and their odors and the kicks of their shoes. I would wake up from my stupor to find myself in their midst, waiting for the ball to be returned” (p. 18). Even though they formed a “system” (p. 20), the author refers to them as “dogs”: “the rabid” at times (p. 12) and “the stray” at other times (p. 24). As she states, in one of the meaningful and condensed phrases, this man was “enraged with me” (p. 14), indicating the “violence” that arises not from authority itself but from those who possess and exercise that authority.
In their dictionary, the female detainee, who ended up in prison by choice and conviction, as mentioned earlier, is labeled as the “leader of chaos.” This judgment is milder and gentler than being labeled as an “adulteress” or “daughter of an adulteress.” It is a form of “double violence” or “multiplicative violence”: the violence of the prison and the violence of men. Even the “prison guard,” who is supposed to sympathize, even secretly, with her fellow women, plays this role, and is no less ferocious than men, as in the case of “La La Al-Azeiza,” who has no connection, whether close or distant, to honor and defiance; this is what many of her behaviors affirmed. However, the oppressive male mentality emerges more boldly and shamelessly this time by replacing the name “Fatima” with “Rashid,” indicating a plan to erase her identity and deliberately humiliate and eradicate her femininity, just as they did with the rest of the female detainees, which is even more horrifying than reducing the detainee to a mere number. In their customs, women are not allowed to depart from the sphere of “the harem” or the realm of “the art of homemaking,” as expressed by some scholars of women’s issues. And attempting to be present in the “public sphere” and have an influence on the “public opinion” is rejected, condemned, and ostracized. In conclusion, the female detainee has no connection to the “world of women.” The executioner tells her, “Now, in our customs, you are a man, and therefore what applies to men applies to you. It is true that we do not shackle the female prisoners, but you have no place among them, no place among them, no place in the world of women” (p. 57).
And then, women are expected to resist and, at this level, “solidify their identity.” Latifa Jbabdi expressed the same idea clearly in the text of the testimony, saying, “Death was truly easier than falling, not because I am a fighter embracing a cause alone, but because I am also a woman, and I had no right to weaken so as not to betray women…” (p. 128). Therefore, the goal is to elevate the prison tunnel to a yard of resistance through “disabling the present” and activating “the work of memory” and “the art of imagination.”
It is worth noting the ideological basis that led Fatima El Bayeh to prison, or rather, the aforementioned prisons. It is undeniable that not all those involved in political work, whether clandestine or direct, were willing to enter prisons, even if they were sincere in their words and actions, and even if the principles of some of them were lofty enough to quote, with some modification, one of the phrases from “The Ash Biography” by Khadija Marwazi. At the ideological level, we do not find a detailed mention regarding the secret organization in which the author engaged within the context of its “iron bars,” as she referred to it (p. 51). In this regard, we only find a few references to the dream of “nation-building” (p. 44), which was repeated in certain places, alongside “honorable sons of the nation” among the detainees, more than others, who had this dream. This means that the author, in her own words, “did not receive bombs, nor did she ride tanks” (p. 57) in order to overthrow “the crown.” However, the aforementioned dream, which was, by the way, framed within a broader context, the context of revolutionary and socialist dreams, was considered an unforgivable crime, as the author referred to it as “the crime of thinking” (p. 58). Thinking like her thinking was considered “criminal,” “prohibited,” and “condemned.”
Until now, the author is still keen not to tarnish her noble and unquestionable ideological past, and how this past was referred to as “political correctness” in some political writings. We do not find any indication, whether in terms of content or necessity, that can be included in the category of “self-criticism,” which usually arises from the support of the intellectual hidden in the performance of the activist or the fighter. Perhaps this falls under what can be called “the ethics of the 1970s,” which had an impact beyond Morocco as well. These ethics no longer have any influence in the “Morocco of today,” especially in the orbit that associates political work with the party facade, which has become worn out, dilapidated, and damaged. In any case, there are still those who insist on referring to the 1970s as the “beautiful era,” and that is “another story,” as they say.
Within the framework of “clarity of work,” emphasis can be placed on the character of the “testimony” which becomes intertwined with “condemnation”: condemnation of the state in general and condemnation of its political violence in particular. And thus, within the realm of testimony/condemnation, the “condition of writing” fades away in its imaginative (possible) worlds that do not contradict writing about the topic of prison. Writing, here, in its “incendiary” nature, is no more than a mere “channel” aimed at attempting to contribute to “taking stock of what happened” from an angry and non-vindictive personal/collective perspective. And just as the goal, with the potential provided by writing for “venting” (and in the crystallized sense in psychoanalysis as well), is “historical” for a dark and gloomy aspect of the 1970s archive. History, in the work, does not reveal itself in complete clarity… it is intermingled in the “text of testimony.” And just as it is blended with “naming,” even if the author of the work does not drown in “scrutiny” and “detail,” or in the term “inventorying the inventory” if we may use a Gramscian term. She seeks to present the “general lines” or “major segments” in the “narrative” and in the perspective that seeks to bring “pain” closer and “update the implicated parties.” In this context, we can also understand the inclusion of testimonials from detainees who accompanied the author in the “darkness” and continued the “conversation in the dark.” This is in addition to the introductory text and the lengthy dedication. There is a kind of desire for a “simultaneous response” in all of this.
Even if this type of historiography does not impose itself strongly on the historian who usually takes caution in writing, which, even in the objective moment of imprisonment, is not devoid of a personal tone and sometimes an emotional one, as in the case of “Conversation in the Dark,” the latter cannot skip over such (proximate) documents in the context of attempting to “understand what happened.” That understanding, which cannot escape “condemnation,” even if it is “calm” and not “thunderous,” all within the orbit that never leaves the realms of “the honor of confrontation” and not “the contamination of evasion.” But did the work say everything that needed to be said? It has indeed said, and from a significant perspective, what must be said… and that is sufficient, and perhaps more importantly, the honor of belonging to the broader and wider confrontation.
The question of re-nationalization
There is no doubt that the above article emerges from deep thinking as well as clear theoretical foundations, whether in the introductions from which the author starts or the conclusions he arrives at. However, in my personal opinion, it seems to present a statement in defense of the methodology, not of the work itself as the subject of analysis, i.e., the methodology as an ontology or as an accomplished approach, rather than an applicable methodology. Hence, we come to the fundamental question about the adaptability of the proposed methodology in naturalizing this style of writing in ways that contribute to expanding literary theory, allowing it to encompass writing styles that extend beyond the literary canon or at least its outskirts. From this perspective, we can say that constructing the concept of memory can reveal the limits of literature, meaning that literature is the question of memory, i.e., the reality that has become imaginary, intersecting the boundaries of imagination with memory, thereby producing literature.