Dystopian Events in the City of Eagles for the Novel “Baghdad’s Morgue” by Burhan Shawi and its Influence on Literary Narration.

Abstract

The political situation, imposed on Iraqi society, affected Iraqi authors and writers and their literary productions, because their ideas and starting point were inspired by the environment in which they live. They wanted through their literary productions to refer to the situation in which Iraq is living from the prevailing social and popular events, and perhaps they intended addressing these social issues through literature. This is what was mentioned in Shawi’s novel, Baghdad’s morgue, in which he portrayed the current Iraqi situation through his idea that Baghdad’s morgue, was a representative example of the Iraqi tragedy. It discusses the social and political issues that the Arab people live in general and the Iraqi people in particular have clearly affected the modern novel. The novelist, Shawi, took his literary material from the social situation in Iraq and the city of Baghdad in particular and took an idea and material from it to write his novel. So, the city has an important and fundamental role. In the field and framework of the utopia that is (good morals) in which the utopia lives. Dystopia is the focus of research which means the bad qualities and deeds in the corrupt city, which does not aim at the happiness of its members having spread in the contemporary Arab novel. Therefore, the novel “Baghdad’s morgue” by the Iraqi writer Burhan Shawi is one of these dystopian novels in which he mentions the human and social conditions in the city of Baghdad to reveal the reasons that prevent the organization of the individual and society’s life in order to see the means of comfort and happiness. Because of the importance of this topic, this research tries to study Shawi’s novel in light of the dystopian elements from a social point of view, in order to know the social causes that develop dystopia in society and how these narrative meanings appear in Shawi's literary environment. The study clarified the narrative reality of the prevailing social conditions in Baghdad, and its relationship to the political situation, as it revealed the author’s boldness in discussing social issues in a literary manner that was difficult for the writer to raise.