THE TREATMENT OF THE POOR NOBODY IN… “THE DEATH OF BED NUMBER 12” [Archives:1998/28/Culture]

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July 13 1998

The concept of being nobody is one of the elemental aspects of democratization of Third World Literature. This concept is well presented in “The death of bed no. 12”, by Gharsan Kanafani, a well known Palestinian writer. The writer in this short story is mainly concerned with ordinary people – poor people who strive to make their way through life by simply accepting their small lot in life as it is. In this short story, the main character, Mohammed Ali Akbar is a representative of a nobody. In this respect, the title of this story suggests the shocking and horrifying experience of Mohammed Ali in a society that refuses to acknowledge his full identity, while the same third world society is willing to provide him with only a death bed. The essence of the story is about a
non-entity.
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Right from the out-set of the story, the writer refers to Mohammed Ali as “him”
to imply that the main character is not considered significant in society. However, the reader soon notices the full name of the main character, his age and his birth place. Mohammed, a 25 year old man, is so poor that poverty is “something engraved on his forehead”, the writer explains. Equally, his village under-goes the same poverty. Since poverty is an inescapable part of his life, Mohammed has disciplined himself to live a “contented poverty”. In this respect, poverty becomes an imposed art and like all arts, it has to be learnt. This is seen when Mohammed seems to be aware of his dizziness, as he puts the “water skins” down on the ground; yet he is convinced that when he picks them up the next morning, he can feel that his existence is continuing over and over again.
Mohammed is a destitute of love, wealth and status. Being raised without the care of his parents, he grows up to be very isolated from his own community. Living in such a poor community, he is even more alienated from the real experience of faraway civilization. And being indifferent to possessing things of great value makes him unprivileged.
Although Mohammed Ali Akbar is “equal” with his community with respect to poverty, he finds himself to be an outcast. When he asks his sister to arrange his marriage with a village girl, she answers, “why not?… we are all equal [here].” Yet the father of his beloved turns him down, accusing him mistakenly for a “scoundrel” who coincidentally has the same first two names of Mohammed Ali. Just as Mohammed attempts to affirm his bond with the village community through marriage, they reject him through the accusation of being a wicked person. This incident has affected Mohammed so much that, from then on, he demanded to be called by his full name: Mohammed Ali Akbar. But the impact was so much greater than his demand that he does not feel his past “contentment” anymore, and his perception towards his own community is shattered. Feeling as a lost identity among his own people, Mohammed’s next step in life is to emigrate (run away) in order to achieve his “fabricated” dream of becoming wealthy as well as to confirm his own existence and entity.
Mohammed’s journey from a rural community to a civilized town is a representative journey of a nobody from innocence and tranquillity into wickedness and madness. On his arrival, Mohammed feels a great sense of betrayal, “he feels as if he has fallen from a fantasy world into the realm of harsh reality,” the writer describes. All the features of a civilized life seem to Mohammed as obstacles standing between him and his dreams.
Being already a nobody in a civilized state, he aimlessly runs through the crowd feeling a deep sense of loss.
Mohammed Ali Akbar as a nobody is a representative victim of a capitalistic society of the Third World. When he gets an “ordinary” job at a shop, he clings with all his strength to the small fortune he always dreamt of. But, exhaustion, a major symptom of a modern society, overcomes his strength without any prior notice, and he his so weak to fight for anything.
His role in this inhumane civilization is played out, and he is simply ruled out of it.
He deems it essential to posses his own identity, for he’s so poor, but society denies him his rights. And when he insists on cherishing the possession of a mere insignificant “box”, in which he saves his little fortune, society intrudes, and finally gets hold of it.
Right after Mohammed’s quietus, the writer, on this helpless situation, comments that Mohammed, “would now be content at being merely
“Bed Number 12″ if he could only be assured about the fate of his box.”
Where there is no social equality, death seems to be the only alternative to life. During Mohammed’s stay at the hospital, he knows nobody and so nobody will visit him. And nobody among the hospital staff could not even care less about him. It is here at the hospital, that he would not allow anybody call him except by his full name. But briefly after his death, Mohammed Ali Akbar loses his full identity as the “male” nurse calls, “Bed number 12 has died!”He was always and still is considered a number among many and not a human being of any significance. Since he is just an ordinary man, he is unworthy of even having a mailing address. And having no recorded address, his burial was attended “solely” by the hospital grave diggers!
In brief, “he” is a representative anti-hero. He finds himself pushed out of the out-skirts of society and life, because of the helplessness in a world over which he has no control. Because of society’s persistence on rejecting social status as an outcast, he is a typical anti-hero.
By Khaled Ghalib Al-Sharai.
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