Defectors and other heirs of ashes in Milton Hatoum

Abstract

The figure of the defector, conceptualized here based on works by Pierre Bourdieu  and Martine Leibovici, has a strong presence in the literary work of Milton Hatoum. In his first three novels, written in a sequence, with elements of continuity from one to another, we will observe a few characters, including the narrators, as this figure who transits between crucial existential dramas, such as orphanhood, bastardy, family lineage, and several forms of strangeness - whether as a foreigner in a host country, a “stranger in the nest” of the family where he or she is born or welcomed, or in other ways of interacting in the world and with the Other. Beings in transit or flight, some of Hatoum’s characters then allow us to show the strangeness, which is sometimes a mirror of our country, and to observe how they encounter, each in their own unexpected way of moving on.