Novelists have stressed the importance of returning to history in literary writing as a way of understanding human beings and their transformations, and of re-reading the present through the past. They noted that the historical novel is not limited to recounting events and characters. It gives the writer wide scope to blend fact with imagination and to raise human questions that remain relevant despite the passage of time.
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These remarks came during a panel discussion titled "Why do we go back to the past?", held as part of the 45th Sharjah International Book Fair. It featured writer and novelist Reehan Khan, Emirati novelist Reem Al Kamali and Egyptian novelist Ashraf El-Ashmawy, and was moderated by Mena Al-Badr. The session discussed the growing popularity of the historical novel, the reasons writers return to earlier eras, and how closely historical stories are tied to the concerns of contemporary people.
Sources of inspiration
Reem Al Kamali spoke about her experience writing historical fiction. She said one of her sources of inspiration was reflecting on ancient statues, the expressions they carry, and the difference between statues of gods, statues of kings and images of ordinary people. That led her to build an imagined novelistic idea within a real historical setting, in her novel Dalma's Statue.
She outlined three ways novels deal with history. The first is to present historical figures as they were, after researching the details of their lives and the events of their time. The second is to blend historical reality with imagination. The third is to place invented characters and events within a real time and place, which is the approach she prefers in her work.
She stressed that the essence of literature lies in the writer's ability to make the reader emotionally engage with the characters and live their feelings, whether the story is based on real events or on imagination.
Understanding one's own story
Reehan Khan explained that historical novels help people understand their own personal stories and answer fundamental questions about their origins and their future. He said literature allows us to explore recurring human concerns such as love, friendship, faith, free will, war and peace.
He cited Homer's epic The Iliad, which raises the question of free will and choice, and argued that this question remains present in an age of artificial intelligence and algorithms and their influence on human decisions. He also referred to Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility and its contrast between emotion and reason, linking it to the nature of online debates and quarrels. He also cited Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov for its treatment of punishment and forgiveness, and Farid al-Din Attar's The Conference of the Birds as a spiritual journey.
He concluded that these works allow the reader to explore their humanity and to understand the questions that have preoccupied people across different eras.
The purpose of returning to the past
Ashraf El-Ashmawy stressed that a novelist does not go back to the past without a purpose. The writer should ask why they have chosen a particular era or figure, whether to understand the present and anticipate the future, or to project a certain vision onto reality. He noted that history in its documentary form can seem dry, focusing on events and their causes, whereas the novel gives it a human dimension that draws the reader in.
He said: "The novel is a lie, yet we tell it with complete honesty so that it leads us to the truth." He explained that the relationship between writer and reader rests on an implicit agreement, under which the reader knows that what they are reading is fiction, but grants the writer their trust and engages with the world he creates.
He added that the historical novel is not bound to strict adherence to the facts. As an example, he pointed to the possibility of imagining a different ending for the July 1952 Revolution in Egypt. He stressed that history belongs not to a state, an entity or particular people, but to everyone. He said it is the novelist's responsibility to address what is left unsaid and to offer their own reading of events. He considered that the details of everyday life are what allow the contemporary reader to see themselves within the old times.
Source: Al-Ghad.
