I sweep the sun off rooftops

267 pages

English language

Published 1998 by Doubleday.

OCLC Number:: 504202539

(1 review)

In the seventeen short stories that comprise I Sweep the Sun Off Rooftops, al-Shaykh limns in evocative prose the shifting and ambiguous power relationships that shape the landscape of the modern Arab world.

Al-Shaykh's characters find themselves at the intersection of tradition and encroaching modernity, of East and West, of the innocence of childhood and the realities of adult life, of the everyday and the fantastical.

In these stories, a woman feigns insanity to escape from an empty marriage, only to have her plans backfire; a young Danish missionary finds herself slowly and inexorably drawn into the world of the Yemeni village where she has been sent to work; a woman's lighthearted attempt to contact the world of the dead turns serious when she encounters the spirit of her late husband.

2 editions

Molly Foust reviewed I sweep the sun off rooftops by Ḥanān Shaykh

Review of 'I sweep the sun off rooftops' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Nearly every story is this collection is a gem, and the writing is exceptionally terse and powerful. Young children on an Oil compound in the middle east are horrified to learn that their Indian servants have been cooking their pet rabbits, their distress calling into question the treatment of servants and the self-serving naivete of children. A woman moves from Morocco to London and learns the humiliations of freedom. Another woman wants to get a divorce but cannot ask for one, so she feigns insanity, which further traps her in her marriage. And my favorite story, "The Land of Dreams" beautifully portrays the impossible reconciliations of culture between the west and east, when a Denmark missionary is proposed to by a Yemeni man. I love the sensations this book provoked- of austerity and sensuality, of intense focus and vague alienation, very excellent.