Tenants and Cobwebs

Samir Naqqash’s stirring novel Tenants and Cobwebs nostalgically commemorates the lost culture of an ancient Iraqi Jewish minority living amidst a majority Muslim population in 1940s Baghdad. The plot unfolds during a time of great turmoil: the rise of Iraqi nationalism and anti-Jewish sentiment fueled by Nazi propaganda; the Farûd, a bloody pogrom carried out against Jewish residents of Baghdad in 1941; and the founding of Israel in 1948. These pivotal events profoundly affected Muslim-Jewish relationships, forever changing the nature of the Jewish experience in Iraq and eventually leading to a mass exodus of Iraqi Jews to Israel in 1951. Tenants and Cobwebs deftly narrates the lives of Jewish characters who refuse to leave Baghdad despite these tumultuous times as well as those who are compelled to leave but nonetheless cling to the life they know. While the Jewish residents appear to live peacefully and harmoniously in the same Baghdad apartment complex as their Muslim neighbors, Naqqash gives voice to their conflicting thoughts and feelings, revealing the deepening tensions between the two groups. His innovative use of Baghdadi Jewish and Muslim dialects captures the complex and nuanced emotions of his characters. Masliyah’s skillful translation gives English-language readers access to one of the most imaginative and ambitious Middle Eastern authors of the twentieth century.