Alif the Unseen
38 pages • 1-hour read
G. Willow WilsonAlif the Unseen
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Themes
Magic Versus Technology
The idea of magic and technology being similar but not quite the same comes up throughout the novel. When Alif and his friends visit Sakina in the Immovable Alley, Alif notices a processor on a shelf. In Irem, Alif pays for a night at an inn by debugging the jinn innkeeper’s computer. If magic and technology were identical, the jinn would have no use for computers. Depending on their spiritual understanding, humans perceive the jinn differently. The human brain is not hardwired to understand magic and must be trained a certain way to comprehend the jinn.
Data encryption represents differences between magic and technology. In Chapter 0, Reza compels a jinn to share stories humans cannot comprehend. Reza copies the stories in Arabic at a time when this language was only for scholars and sheikhs. The jinn encrypt their stories so humans cannot use them, and Reza then encrypts the stories so only the chosen few humans may gain from their knowledge. The encryption of magic against the lower classes contrasts with the technological government crackdown on information during the main timeline of the book. Rather than keeping knowledge from the lower classes, Alif and his fellow hackers use data encryption to allow common people to speak freely.
Magic and technology are combined with harmful results. When Alif attempts to code the Alf Yeom, the program destabilizes, and the computer fries. Alif’s fingers burn as a result of being in contact with the melting computer. The Hand’s failed attempt to code the Alf Yeom also results in destabilization, but in this case, society destabilizes. The Hand is killed, and the people rise up to take control from him. Magic was the original data encryption. When humans attempt to understand it, destruction ensues. When society comes out from under the technological barrier of data encryption on the internet, change is achieved. Things are broken but, unlike with magic, can be put back together. The Hand’s demise represents what happens when magic and technology are forced together. Alif’s triumph, since he gave up on the idea of turning the Alf Yeom into a computer program, represents the positive results of magic and technology not being combined.
Names and Identity
Throughout the book, the idea of name as identity is called into question. Tin Sari (Alif’s computer program) finds people based on who they are rather than the technological specifications usually required for a computer to track a person. Sheikh Bilal poses the question of whether an individual’s identity changes in cyberspace. He asks if a sin committed by a virtual avatar is also committed by the person controlling the avatar. This question encompasses whether people are still themselves online, even when they take a handle different from their real name.
Alif is the most apparent representation of this theme. He took the first letter of the Arabic alphabet as his internet handle. Since he feels more comfortable online than he does in real life, Alif adopted his handle as his name and no longer responds to Mohammad. Tin Sari’s success in tracking Intisar introduces the idea that names mean nothing. A person may change their name, but they cannot change who they are. While dying in prison, Alif loses everything but his identity and realizes the name Alif is something he hides behind out of fear. By the end of the book, Alif comes out of hiding. He accepts his identity and recognizes himself as Mohammad again.
Tin Sari also answers Sheikh Bilal’s query. Its ability to find someone by their computer use means real-life personalities translate into cyberspace. During the rebellion in the book’s final chapters, Alif tells the Hand Tin Sari works because it recognizes the apparent in a person and that the apparent cannot hide behind a new name. Due to this understanding, Alif relinquishes his handle to become Mohammad.
In Chapter 7, Alif creates a new email address to ask Intisar to meet him about the Alf Yeom. Though the message came from a new address on a computer Alif had never used, he (Alif/Mohammad) still sent the email. At the end of the book, NewQuarter observes that it doesn’t matter if he is NewQuarter and has done many things to aid the common people. His identity is still as a prince, regardless of who he is online. A person can create whatever identity they want in cyberspace, but who they are does not change.
Belonging
Many of the book’s characters face the desire to find where they belong. Alif’s conflict of belonging begins in the first chapter. He is of mixed heritage (half-Arabic, half-Indian). His father is an upper-class man who has been mostly absent from Alif’s life, leaving Alif caught between his lower-class family and the occasional, uncomfortable interactions with the upper class that doesn’t want him. Alif feels he belongs with his gray hats on the internet, but he cannot fully live online.
Alif’s relationships with Intisar and Dina represent his search for belonging. At the beginning of the book, Alif wants so badly to belong with Intisar. Intisar is rich, is of a single heritage, and knows her place in society. Alif creates a sense of belonging with her to cover his insecurities. When Intisar breaks up with him, Alif must confront who he is. Dina is in the same class as Alif. Though she chooses to cover her face, she is comfortable in her skin. Alif comes to understand this about Dina over the course of the book. At the end, Alif finds his place with Dina in the world he’s always known. He recognizes his feelings for Intisar as a shield he hid behind and cuts her loose.
The convert is also on a search for belonging. She is an American who has changed religion and location to find her place in the world. She fights her connection with Vikram because he doesn’t fit the idea of who she wants to be. She ultimately agrees to marry him to be protected among the jinn. The night of their wedding, she falls in love and wakes to find herself able to see and understand the unseen world. With Vikram’s death, she realizes she belonged with him and, thus, among the jinn.
Alif and the convert show that people from any culture or background struggle to find belonging. When the convert finds she belongs in the unseen world, Alif realizes Americans have the same emotions and fears as his own people. The theme of belonging shows how all humans are alike.
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