The Parisian

Set against the backdrop of World War I, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, and the early years of British-controlled Palestine, the novel follows Midhat Kamal, a young Palestinian Arab from the city of Nablus, as he comes of age between France and his homeland.

In October 1914, nineteen-year-old Midhat sails from Alexandria to Marseille to study medicine at the University of Montpellier, escaping Ottoman conscription. On the voyage, he befriends Faruq al-Azmeh, an Arabic professor at the Sorbonne. In Montpellier, he is welcomed into the household of Frédéric Molineu, a university anthropologist, and meets Frédéric's daughter, Jeannette Molineu.

Midhat's childhood has been marked by loss. His mother died of tuberculosis when he was two. His father, Haj Taher Kamal, a textile merchant based in Cairo, remarried a young Egyptian woman named Layla, who resented her stepson. Raised by his grandmother, Um Taher, near Nablus, Midhat was later sent to the Mekteb-i Sultani, a French-model boarding school in Constantinople. Before he left for France, his father gave him a gold pocket watch that becomes a recurring symbol throughout the novel.

In Montpellier, Midhat befriends Laurent Toupin, a medical student. His relationship with Jeannette develops slowly. She is a reserved young woman who studied philosophy and lost her mother, Ariane, to suicide when she was sixteen. Wartime grief loosens Jeannette's composure, and she confides in Midhat about her mother's mysterious nervous illness. They take secret morning walks and gradually fall in love.

At a December party, Laurent confesses that he still loves Jeannette and announces he is leaving for war. In an impulsive gesture, Midhat gives him his father's gold watch. Months later, Midhat asks Jeannette whether she loved Laurent. Offended, she avoids him until they reconcile and Midhat confesses his love. Jeannette brings him a doctor's report on her mother's condition, and they begin researching Ariane's illness together. When news arrives that Laurent has been killed at Ypres by a drunken officer, grief draws them into a secret romance conducted in unused rooms of the Molineu house.

Midhat then discovers that Frédéric has been using him as an anthropological subject, taking detailed notes about his language and cultural habits. At a dinner with Sylvain Leclair, an old family friend whom Midhat suspects of having abused Ariane, Midhat erupts. He accuses Sylvain and confronts Frédéric about studying him. Frédéric claims he was attempting "to humanise" Midhat. Jeannette does not defend Midhat, and when he shares his theory about Sylvain, she says he is wrong. Midhat leaves the Molineu house before dawn.

He flees to Paris, moves in with Faruq, abandons medicine, and enrolls in history at the Sorbonne. He has affairs with several women and joins the Syrian exile community's debates about Arab independence and Zionism. He grows close to Hani Murad, a Nabulsi law graduate who becomes secretary to Emir Faisal's Arab Delegation at the Paris Peace Conference. Before leaving in 1919, Midhat writes Jeannette a farewell letter expressing his enduring love.

The novel's second part shifts to Palestine and introduces the Hammad family. Haj Nimr Hammad, the mayor of Nablus, heads a prominent clan. His eldest daughter, Fatima Hammad, is a sixteen-year-old apprenticed in household management whose mother, Widad, pushes for a marriage to a cousin while Nimr holds out for a wealthier match.

Midhat stops in Cairo on his way home, where Layla receives him. A lilac-colored letter from Jeannette arrives at the Kamal house in Nablus. Haj Taher, unable to read French, takes it to the British military governor, who reads it aloud: It is a love letter asking Midhat to return. Taher hides it. When Midhat reaches Nablus, his father forbids any return to France, threatens disinheritance, and demands he learn the family trade. He also instructs Um Taher to find Midhat a wife.

Midhat works at the family store in the khan, a commercial courtyard, and becomes known as "the Parisian" for his European manners. Um Taher arranges for him to glimpse Fatima. Midhat proposes twice to Nimr, who refuses both times. At the April 1920 Nebi Musa festival in Jerusalem, a pilgrimage that has become a venue for political protest, Midhat and Fatima catch sight of each other in the crowd. Violence erupts; Midhat flees while his cousin Jamil Kamal witnesses killings that radicalize him. Afterward, Fatima resolves to choose Midhat and asks her father to accept the match. Nimr agrees to consider it; he later visits the Kamal store with his approval.

During Ramadan, Haj Taher dies of a heart attack in Cairo. Midhat discovers that his father left the family business in Layla's name, leaving him only a small inheritance. He uses it to pay the mahr, or marriage dowry, and buy a house on the outskirts of Nablus. The wedding takes place after Eid al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. On their wedding night, Fatima is terrified and climbs atop the cupboard. The next day, the couple begins a cautious courtship, and that night Fatima initiates physical contact; they consummate the marriage.

Years pass. Midhat opens a clothing shop, Nouveautés Ghada, with Eli Kahen, a Samaritan tailor. He and Fatima have four children. Fatima grows bitter about their modest social position, while Midhat maintains a bon vivant lifestyle. Jamil devotes himself to the nationalist cause, and his bond with Midhat frays. A letter from Midhat's half-brother Musbah reveals that Haj Taher died in debt and believed Midhat's education made him self-sufficient. Midhat burns the letter.

In 1935, a fire destroys much of the shop. Searching his father's old study, Midhat pries up a floor tile and discovers Jeannette's lilac letter, hidden by his father years ago. In it, Jeannette apologizes, confesses her enduring love, and asks him to return. The revelation that his father intercepted a letter that could have changed his life triggers a complete psychological collapse. He is hospitalized in Nablus and then transferred to the British psychiatric hospital in Bethlehem, where he hallucinates Jeannette and attacks a patient over a gold pocket watch he believes is the one he gave Laurent.

While Midhat is hospitalized, the 1936 Arab Revolt begins with a countrywide general strike. Jamil operates as a fighter and strike committee organizer but is killed in a British ambush while smuggling weapons from Transjordan. Fatima and the children shelter at her parents' house. Um Taher enlists the family to extract Midhat from the hospital, and Fatima convinces the matron to release him.

Midhat returns to find the streets empty. He learns of Jamil's death and washes and shrouds his cousin's body. Hani arrives to deliver a eulogy praising Jamil as a martyr. When Hani touches Midhat's cheek in farewell, Midhat understands that his friend has seen the letter from Jeannette and feels relief at being known.

Weeks later, Midhat walks to the hospital with his youngest daughter, Ghada, and encounters Père Antoine, a French Dominican priest who has spent years studying Nablus. Midhat tells him about his time in France and admits he held a "fantasy of virtue" about the country. He says that when he looks at his life, he sees a list of beautiful mistakes he would not change. He says, "Father, I forgive you," words that resonate with his unresolved grief for his own father. As the call to prayer sounds, Midhat collects Ghada and walks home through the quiet, strike-bound streets of Nablus.