Three Drops of Madeleine

Saleem Albeik  |  The AFAC Novel Writing Program  |  2015  |  Palestine
There are two narrators in this story, the first being the author and the second being the main character around whom the story revolves. The first narrator is more attached to what the author has lived, and the second narrator is building his reality based on the former’s life and on a certain imagination required by the novel. The main protagonist in the story- the second narrator- is living an identity crisis on two levels: The first is in relation to the definition of being a Palestinian. He does not belong to the Palestinians of the West Bank, neither to the Palestinians of Gaza, nor to the Palestinians displaced in 1948, as his grandfather had taken refuge in Syria in that year. He didn’t live in the refugee camps and cities of Syria, because his time was divided between one of the camps and the United Arab Emirates, where he didn’t have any ties to the Palestinian community. He later goes moves on to a different life as a refugee in France. However, he does not belong to Palestinians in Europe or in France. He does not belong to any community, city or country. His troubles go beyond a sense of belonging to Palestine, or the Palestinian people but also to a sense of belonging to other communities