"Generation after Generation:" Translating a Palestinian Resistance Novel for the Palestinian Diaspora and World

Keywords: Palestine, translation, prison
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

This paper reflects on the collective process of translation of the Palestinian novel, The Trinity of Fundamentals by Wisam Rafeedie. The Trinity of Fundamentals is a fictionalized account of the author’s experience going into hiding between 1982-1991 in the West Bank. For nine years, the revolutionary protagonist of the novel, Kan’an Subhi, evades the occupation’s capture while contributing to the building of organization and the popular resistance of the First Intifada (1987-1993). Rafeedie originally wrote his novel in an Israeli prison (Al-Naqab Ansar 3) in 1993, but it was stolen by prison guards. The Palestinian prisoners’ movement ultimately liberated it, leading to publication in 1998. Nearly three decades later, the Palestinian Youth Movement—a grassroots political organization of Palestinian and Arab youth abroad--brought the novel to English-language readers. Published in February 2024, The Trinity of Fundamentals sold 10,000 copies within its first month in press. In this paper, I share my perspective as one of fourteen Palestinians in diaspora engaging in translation as a collective process. In fact, the production, circulation, and translation of The Trinity of Fundamentals is characterized by collective Palestinian knowledge production that disrupts the 76-yearlong attempt to fragment Palestinian society and liquidate the struggle for liberation through occupation, genocide, and ethnic cleansing. Given the Zionist repression of Palestinian revolutionary knowledge production in Palestine and in North America, this spatially dynamic model of translation is one that offers crucial lessons for geographers invested in practicing translation in solidarity.