Rawi Hage (Anansi)
Following up his IMPAC Dublin Literary
Award-winning debut novel, De Niro’s Game, Lebanon-born,
Montreal-based Canadian novelist Rawi Hage storms back with
Cockroach, another probing, intriguing and powerfully thrilling
immersion into the mindset and mores of mainstream Middle Eastern
agnostics. This time, however, Hage pitches his compelling story not in
sectarian violence-ravaged Beirut, but in wintery Montreal. Hage
shrewdly borrows from Kafka’s Metamorphosis to image his unnamed
narrator’s sense of “outsiderness;” “a vermin, a bug” in “white city”
Montreal. “I do not feel truly human.” Structurally, two narrative
threads move the story forward. One details the present in Montreal as
events unfold for the narrator, surviving as a restless busboy and
petty thief who, incredibly, uses his B&E skills to sneak into the
domiciles of those he becomes acquainted with to learn more about them.
The other strand, uncovered by psychiatric questioning, delves into
past stomach-wrenching incidents in Lebanon that indelibly shaped the
narrator’s character. The two storylines interlaced, Cockroach drives to its inexorable violent conclusion. Vivaciously, vitally, Hage
humanizes “the other” for us non-immigrant Canadians. A fascinating
read. —Graham Pilsworth
This article appears in Sep 25 – Oct 1, 2008.