1. Plot

2. Sensory symbolism

3. Critical reception

4. References

5. External links

Sattouf’s father influenced the name of the book through his ideal of raising his son as an Arab of the future. Early in the story, the elder Sattouf proclaims, "I'd change everything among the Arabs. I'd force them to stop being bigots, to educate themselves, and to enter into the modern world. I'd be a good President."

Purposefully written from the perspective of a child, Sattouf employs simplistic yet comprehensive drawings that are more rudimentary yet not entirely dissimilar to his other works such as “La Vie Secrète des Jeunes”, his column in the famous satirical French magazine, Charlie Hebdo.^[5] Both The Arab of the Future and La Vie Secrète des Jeunes are written from Sattouf’s point of view, with the former describing his childhood and the latter his daily observations as an adult. Although both appear autobiographical, at least one reviewer calls into question elements of Sattouf's life story and family history.^[2]

Plot

Part one of three planned volumes, The Arab of the Future begins in France, where Riad Sattouf is born in 1978. He describes himself as a “perfect” little boy with "platinum-blonde hair" and “bright puppy-dog eyes.” Riad is the eldest son of Clémentine, a reserved French woman, and Abdul-Razak Sattouf, a flamboyant Sunni-Syrian man. They met when Clémentine took pity on Abdul-Razak's clueless failure to attract a friend of hers.

A major theme of the novel is how young Riad looks up to his father as a hero. Abdul-Razak, however, is portrayed as a complex character, being educated, ambitious and a loving father, yet also hypocritical, sexist, racist, and simultaneously authoritarian towards his wife and children yet almost infantile in his relationships with his mother and elder brother. Abdul-Razak appears particularly conflicted over religion; he prefers to describe himself as a secular modernizer (he drinks wine, eats pork, and does not pray) but he also exhorts his son to respect God and to learn to read the Qur'an, seemingly motivated by the pressure of his conservative family and Syrian society.

With Clémentine transcribing his words and "rendering them intelligible," Abdul-Razak obtains a Ph.D. in history from the Sorbonne. In 1980, he moves the family to Libya after accepting a job as an associate professor. (He is paid in US dollars, with the funds sent to an account in the Channel Islands.)

Prime Minister Muammar Gaddafi has abolished private property, meaning all unoccupied housing is free for the taking. This causes the Sattouf family to lose their first residence when a policeman's family claims it. They are forced to move into a large apartment block described as a "ghetto for expatriates." Riad befriends with two neighbor children: Abani, an Indian girl, and Adnan, a Yemeni boy. Despite his very young age, Riad observes the propaganda of the Gaddafi regime and frequent food scarcity and rationing. The family remains in Libya for two years, during which Riad's grandmother and uncle visit them from Syria. When Gaddafi's state of the popular masses declares new laws requiring people of different social classes to swap occupations, Abdul-Razak fears losing his teaching job, and the family leaves Libya in 1982.

The family returns to France for a short period. Riad meets his recently-divorced, womanizing maternal grandfather, then they stay with Riad's grandmother in Brittany. She teaches him about the family's history and her own physically abusive grandmother. She draws parallels between the rural France of the past, exemplified by her elderly neighbor who lives in extremely rustic conditions, and the developing Arab world of the modern era. Riad attends the local kindergarten, where he is praised for his drawings of French president Georges Pompidou and a sculpture of a bull. While in France, Clémentine gives birth to Riad's younger brother, Yahya.

Abdul-Razak obtains a teaching job in Syria and the family moves to his hometown Teir Maalah, near Homs. Riad encounters severe bullying, in which two cousins accuse him of being Jewish and mercilessly torment him—seemingly because of his blond hair and foreign mother. The cousins' enmity appears to be entangled with a financial dispute between their father and Riad's father. Riad also witnesses strict segregation of genders and sects, media censorship, animal abuse, corruption, poor sanitation, and crippling poverty. Riad befriends Wael and Mohammad, two other cousins who teach him Syrian Arabic; they try to protect him from the two bullies, who are their uncles though around the same age. Riad observes the cult of personality surrounding Hafez al-Assad, who he sees as more sinister than Libya's Gaddafi. Abdul-Razak wants Riad to begin school, but Clémentine fears he is too young—then forbids it entirely after witnessing a group of boys torture and kill a puppy for sport.

The Sattouf family returns suddenly to Brittany. Riad's grandmother has remarried and her new husband takes a liking to Riad. Riad is relieved and expects that the family will remain in France for good. The family travels to the Bailiwick of Jersey to retrieve Abdul-Razak's Libyan salary, in cash, from his offshore bank account. Riad becomes terrified when his father—who now has money to build his dream villa—makes plans to return to Syria, knowing that he will have to attend school there and face his bullies.

Sensory symbolism

Sattouf employs a repeating pattern of color schemes throughout the comic. Basic line drawings are black and white, and a general color tint signifies the location of the events. Certain objects and speech bubbles have thematic coloring. Red is regularly applied to loud speech, danger and violence, while non-verbal noises ( hisses and growls, for example) are green.

France is tinted light blue, and its art and media (such as radio, photographs and sculpture) are colored bright red. Libya's panels are tinted mustard yellow, while bright green is applied to TV broadcasts, loud noises, Libyan flags, portraits of Muammar Gaddafi and, of course, Gaddafi's manifesto The Green Book. Syria is represented by light pink. Its electronic music and speech bubbles are green; red is applied to television and the speech of a mythical creature in a folktale. Finally, a short time spent on the Bailiwick of Jersey is tinted light green.

Critical reception

The Arab of the Future has received widespread critical acclaim and is considered an instant classic among graphic memoirs. The text has been translated into sixteen languages,^[6] demonstrating its international appeal.

Michel Hazanavicius, Academy Award winning director of The Artist, proclaims “Seriously funny and penetratingly honest, Riad Sattouf tells the epic story of his eccentric and troubled family. Written with tenderness, grace, and piercing clarity, The Arab of the Future is one of those books that transcend their form to become a literary masterpiece."^[7]

References

External links

• The Arab of the Future website.

• Sir Edward Hales, 2nd Baronet
• Sir Edward Hall Alderson
• Sir Edward Hamley
• Sir Edward Harley
• Sir Edward Hartopp, 1st Baronet
• Sir Edward Harwood
• Sir Edward Hertslet
• Sir Edward Hoare, 2nd Baronet
• Sir Edward Hoby
• Sir Edward Hoby, 1st Baronet
• Sir Edward Hungerford
• Sir Edward Hussey, 3rd Baronet
• Sir Edward Hussey Packe
• Sir Edward James Reid, 2nd Baronet
• Sir Edward John Johnson-Walsh, 2nd Baronet
• Sir Edward Johnson-Ferguson, 1st Baronet
• Sir Edward Lawrence Levy
• Sir Edward Littleton, 2nd Baronet
• Sir Edward Littleton, 4th Baronet
• Sir Edward Loftus, 1st Baronet
• Sir Edward Mansel, 4th Baronet
• Sir Edward Marshall-Hall
• Sir Edward Marsh Merewether
• Sir Edward Maugar Iliffe
• Sir Edward Montague