‘Magical Realism’ Existentialized in Saadawi’s Frankenstein in Baghdad

Abstract

From the very onset of its literary transformation, magical realism has taken on Postcolonial and Postmodern stances toward the appropriation of cultural identity. Normalizing the invasion of cultural history and heritage – having become long-forgotten myths of culture – in a modernized setting, gives cultural identity the presencing urgency its authenticity requires, thus creating a postcolonial text or a postmodern individual reminded of an indigenous identity. However, from the standpoint of a war-torn country, this paper argues that the genre requires immediate presencing of existential nature to that which invokes cultural heritage. In other words, in the context of war, an immediate act of presencing is required as otherwise the subject’s inaction may be the cause of not mere identity but also physical nonexistence. In this sense, immediate urgency affected by direct contact with chaos is understood to require a more immediate approach than those offered by postcolonialism and postmodernism. The study then investigates the possibility of fathoming magical realism from an Existential lens within the context of war as projected in Ahmed Saadawi’s Frankenstein in Baghdad, especially when a calling shifts from individual retribution to victimization, thus taking the analysis typically associated with the genre a step further.