First published in 1962 Men in the Sun is both a classic of Arab literature and of what
Kanafani himself would term ' resistance literature' . Three Palestinian men embark on a
brutal and treacherous odyssey across the Iraqi desert to Kuwait not for liberation but
material betterment. Their driver a jaded fat former freedom fighter living with his own
compromises and contradictions makes for a garrulous if cavalier companion. Both the
indifferent brutality of border bureaucracy and the blank aggression of the sun see that things
grow steadily more stark. The author' s ardent politics are apparent throughout but the
novel' s characters are their own beings: ambivalent conflicted creatures of context. While
breezily conversational with disarming dreamy strokes of lyricism this short novel delivers
a shuddering and grounding dose of true horror. As well as the titular novella the book
features six short stories including the timelessly resonant ' Letter From Gaza'
Kanafani' s first published work written when he was twenty and the essential ' The
Land of Sad Oranges' .
