Letters Of The Observer
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Letters Of The Observer is a philosophical, thriller and romantic novel written by the Syrian author Kamal Korkees. His first novel tells the story of Joseph Rizk, a Syrian misanthrop, but intelligent, young man who moves from Baniyas, Syria to Paris, France to study philosophy at the Sorbonne. As soon as he starts his academic journey, he meets a young Dutch lady called Noor van der Hemel, who is also studying philosophy at the Sorbonne, which he falls in love with. The story is devided into 11 chapters, followed by an epilogue, a series of letters that Joseph wrote to Noor, and an afterword where Korkees explains why he wrote the novel and what his thoughts are on the novel, accompanied by his gratitude to his beta-readers and the Noor he said he loved, which he describes as a "true femme fatale"[1]. The story is told in third-person narration. The book was published on 11 November 2023 in paperback format, and was published later that month in Kindle format.
Main story[edit]
The story begins with Joseph arriving to a train station in Paris and him journaling about how he hates the city and that he wishes to go back. Following directions that were written in his diary, and a little help from an old French woman who told him where to go, he reaches the main entrance of Sorbonne. As he is smoking in front of the entrance, he sees Svetlana from afar, a Russian young lady who was walking into the building. Joseph goes into the building and gets redirected to the student's admission bureau to complete his admission, only to learn that he needs to buy books, which he does not have the money for. Joseph leaves the office with anger and sees Svetlana sitting on a bench in the corridor of the Sorbonne; he approaches her and asks her about the lectures and where they will be held. Svetlana gives that information to Joseph and, after talking with him for a while, offers him a room in the apartment she lives in; she gives him a piece of paper with the address on it. Joesph declines the offer, takes the address and leaves the Sorbonne. He starts walking around Paris looking for a café to sit in; he sees one and tries to sit in one of the tables but is confronted by a French child who happens to be a beggar that asks Joseph for money. Joseph yells at the child and tells him to go away; the child steals Joseph's diary and runs away. Joseph becomes angry and tries to sit in the café but the waiter tells him that if he is not going to order anything he cannot sit; Joseph yells at the waiter and leaves. Filled with anger, Joseph starts walking along the Seine and decided that sleeping at Svetlana's is the only solution that he has. He asks a police officer about the address that was written on the paper and he gets the directions he needs the reach Svetlana's apartment. Svetlana welcomes him and invites him into her home. She asks Joseph about his life story, and he tells it to her, while eating soup together. Svetlana gives him the room the looks onto the street and he promises her to pay her back from the money that he shall receive from his family back home.
On the first day of lectures, Joseph walks with Svetlana to the Sorbonne and she tells him about a route he can take that would save him time. Joseph and Svetlana walk into the lecture hall and get assigned into groups; Svetlana and Joseph are assigned to the same group, along with a man named Jean and a Dutch lady named Noor van der Hemel. Joseph cannot take his eyes of off Noor and decides ask her out for coffee; Noor says that she can't at the moment and tells him that they can walk together. Joseph understands, agrees, and walks Noor home. On their way, Joseph starts talking with Noor about his hatred towards humans and his thoughts on the matter. Noor does not agree with him but she says that she understands what he is telling her; Joseph takes it as if she got weirded out and get angry at himself. Noor reaches her apartment, which was across the street from Svetlana's apartment on the second storey (Svetlana's apartment is on the third) and Joseph bids his farewell to Noor. Svetlana, who works at a café directly under her apartment, approaches Joseph when he was standing in front of Noor's building in self-loathing and asks him about his encounter with Noor. Joseph is filled with too much self-loathing to the point where he passes out.
Joseph wakes up with a damp cloth on his forehead and tells Svetlana about what had happened; she argues that Europeans act in such manner because they do not live with passion. Svetlana also tells Joseph that Noor has a fiance but Joseph doesn't believe her. Joseph tells Svetlana that he is feeling better and that he must go to the post-office to get the money that his family sent him. Both of them go to the post-office and Joseph gets more money than he had hoped for and a letter from his brother Jacob in which he tells Joseph that their parents were killed by an Ottoman Pasha because they couldn't pay him the loan back, which Joseph's father took beacuse of a drought that took place which killed all of the tobacoo leaves that his father was supposed to sell and send the money of to Joseph. Jacob tells Joseph that he killed the Pasha and his family in vendetta and that he took all the Pasha's money and split it in half with Joseph. Upon reading the letter, Joseph gives the letter to Svetlana, has a delirium and is taken home by a carriage. Joseph reaches Svetlana's apartment and locks himself in his room.
Joseph spends the week in his room with no food and a little of water; he spent the week reading a novel he brought with him, smoking cigarettes, and looking onto Noor's apartment. Svetlana convinces him to come out and talk with her; he agrees and comes out of the room. After some talking, Joseph gives a huge amount of money to Svetlana, which he explains to be a whole year worth of rent and food. Svetlana agrees with difficulty and takes the money. On Sunday, Joseph stays up all night with the thought of Noor in his head and waits for her until she departs to the Sorbonne, which he takes as a chance to talk and walk with her. The two talk all the way to the Sorbonne and walk back home together after the lectures. When Noor reaches her building, Joseph asks Noor out again for lunch; Noor declines again, arguing that she had already made food for herself at home. Joseph goes upstairs to his apartment and enters it in wrath. Svetlana tries to calm him down but Joseph starts cussing and yelling about how he fell in love with Noor.
After weeks of walking and talking with Noor, Joseph grows more love for Noor, and at one occasion when the two were walking together, Noor passes out in the street. Joseph becomes hysterical and tries everything to make her wake up. After some minutes, Noor wakes up and is very tired; Joseph makes sure that Noor can stand up on her own and then asks to look at her fingernails. When she lets him, he argues that she needs to eat more because she has a vitamins deficiency, which were represented by the big white marks on her fingernails. Noor thanks Joseph and climbs up the stairs to her apartment. Joseph also goes up the stairs, but he sits on the staircase midway and starts smoking in fatigue; Joseph starts crying on the stairs for a while, but he hears someone coming up the stairs, which turns out to be Svetlana. Svetlana knows that something had went wrong with Noor and pats Joseph on his shoulder, telling him to come inside. Joseph talks with Svetlana about Noor and how much he loved her over a bottle of wine. Joseph than decided to write a romantic letter to Noor in which he pours his heart out to her. Svetlana expresses that she has no faith that the letter will do any good; Joseph writes the letter anyways and falls asleep on his desk.
Joseph waits for a week to give Noor the letter. On a Monday, Joseph dresses well and goes downstairs to the café where Svetlana works. Svetlana serves him coffee while he waits for Noor to come down from her apartment. After an hour of waiting, Joseph becomes anxious and runs up the stairs to Noor's apartment looking for her. One of Noor's neighbors, a French man, tells Joseph in anger that she left a long time ago. Joseph becomes hysterical and thinks that Noor left France and went back to the Netherlands. After some thinking, Joseph decides to check the Sorbonne first, and when he reaches the Sorbonne, he sees Noor sitting with a group of students. Joseph asks Noor if he could talk with her in private and the two go and sit in an empty lecture hall. Joseph confesses his love to Noor and gives her the letter. Joseph says that he thinks that the two will never talk with each other after she reads the letter; Noor assures him that they will in fact keep talking to each other. Joseph than leaves the Sorbonne a happy man.
Joesph decides that it is time to visit an Orthodox church his mother had told him to visit so he can keep his faith while in France. He reaches the church and talks with the Elder of the church, Nikolaos, in his office. Joseph tells the Elder about his sins (mainly the hatred he had for the humankind) and about his relationship with Noor and how much he loves her while crying. The Elder tells him that he should repent by loving humans again, one at a time. As Joseph was getting ready to leave the Elder's office, Joseph apologizes for not introducing himself and tells him that he knew about his church through another Elder who was still in Syria, Abraham Ignatius. The Elder Nikolaos expresses his happiness about the matter and tells Joseph to stay so he can tell him about the well being of Abraham.
Joseph leaves the church and starts walking around Paris until he reaches a plaza where people were gathered at in the evening. Joseph lets out a scream of agony and anger and everybody goes silent. Joseph starts yelling at the people around the plaza about how much he loves Noor and that they will never understand what she meant to him. As Joseph was yelling, his screams get cut off by the presence of the old woman who helped him reach the Sorbonne. Joesph, remembering his mother, throws himself in the mud and onto the feet of the old woman, telling her that he misses his mother dearly. Joseph goes back home in the middle of the night, and Svetlana, after opening the door for Joseph in fear, expresses her worries about Joseph. Joseph starts having a minor delirium and decides that every time he would think about Noor, he would write her a letter and will keep it at his desk. Svetlana doesn't agree with Joseph but she doesn't stop him either.
After months of Joseph's coping mechanism, Joseph gets invited to a graduation gala for first-year students. Joseph decides to give Noor all the letters that he wrote in the previous months. Svetlana tells him that it is not a good idea to do so; Joseph disagrees with her. As Joseph was ready to depart, he is ambushed by two Turkish-speaking men who try to abduct him. Joseph tries to fight them off, and as he is kicking them away, he sees the Elder, Nikolaos, crying and praying behind the men while looking at the ground in reverence. Joseph tells Svetlana to not help him and to give Noor the letters; Svetlana tries to help Joseph regardless but is pushed onto the ground. The two men take Joseph downstairs and throw him in a carriage; the two men push the Elder, Nikolaos, away and onto the ground after they throw Joseph in.
After some weeks, Sevtlana wakes up in a gloomy mood and enters Joseph's empty room with sadness then goes back into her own room to get ready for the day. As she was getting ready for the day, she sees Jacob's letter in the drawer of her desk and decides to burn it in hops that, if the men come back, they will have no evidence on Joseph. Svetlana goes to the Sorbonne and sees Noor entering the Sorbonne. Svetlana approaches Noor and talks with her about Joseph in a bad manner; Noor agrees with Svetlana and invites her for a cup of tea at her apartment. In Turkey, Joseph was getting tortured and questioned about his brother Jacob. The Ottoman officer tells Joseph that he knew Joseph's whereabouts by threatening the Elder, Abraham, with his family and forcing him to tell on Joseph and the other Elder, Nikolaos. Joseph tells the officer nothing about Jacob and get thrown into a jail cell after many hours of beating. Svetlana goes to Noor's apartment with the letters the Joseph wrote for her and confronts her about what she did to Joseph. Noor argues that Joseph was mentally unstable and that she did not have a fiance. Svetlana yells at Noor, throws the letters at her, and goes back home crying. Noor reads the letters while sobbing and crying while she feels guilt.
Epilogue[edit]
Joseph befriends one of the guards in the prison, who in return brought him food and cigarettes. The two keep doing that for a couple of weeks until, on one occasion, Joseph gets beaten up badly and is thrown back in his cell with many wounds. The officer brings him a singular cigarette, but Joseph tells him that he has no energy to get up and take it from his hands. The guard enters the cell and sits on the ground with Joseph and they smoke a cigarette together. The other guards realize that one of the cells is open and, along with the officer that questioned Joseph, walk to the cell to check only to see the guard and Joseph sitting on the ground smoking together. The officer is filled with anger and orders the guard and Joseph to be brought to his office. The officer yells at the guard but Joseph saves him by saying that he was trying to lure the guard in so he can take his gun to make an escape, or to shoot himself. The officer believes Joseph and lets the guard go. He then shoots Joseph in the neck. Svetlana buys the apartment from it's owner and gets married; she has a son which she names Joseph. She also gets her bachelor's in analytic philosophy, along with a master's degree and a PhD in the same field. Jacob lives in the mountains until the fall of the Ottoman Empire, but then is killed my Ottoman Loyalists in Damascus. The officer who shot Joesph fights the British in Egypt in the first World War and dies there, becoming a hero in his hometown of Ankara. Nikolaos goes back to Greece so his son, Alexander, can take of the church in Paris; he dies with his wife of old age. Noor does not finish her studies and goes back to Amsterdam; she marries a civil servant but divorces him after having her only daughter with him, Anneke. Noor dies in World War II; Anneke studies Middle Eastern Politics and moves to Beirut, Lebanon where she dedicates her life to research and journalism until she dies in the Lebanese Civil War.
Characters[edit]
Joseph Rizk is the protagonist; a 24 years old Syrian man who moves to France. Korkees describes him as the upcoming existenialist.
Svetlana Ivanovna Zeitseva is Joseph's roommate and friend; a Russian lady from Saint Petersburg. Korkees describes her as the absurdist.
Noor van der Hemel is the deuteragonist and the love of Joseph; a Dutch lady from Amsterdam.
Nikolaos Stathopoulos is the Elder of the church in Paris; a Greek priest.
Jacob Rizk is the brother of Joseph; a 19 years old man.
Abraham Ignatuis is the Elder of the church in Baniyas, Syria, and the patriarch of the Oriental Orthodox Church in all the Levant, Asia Minor and a part of the Caucases.
Jean is a student at the Sorbonne.
The Old Woman is an unnamed woman who helps Joseph reach the Sorbonne when he arrives to France.
The Officer is an Ottoman officer who tortures and questions Joseph while he is captured in Turkey.
Themes[edit]
The novel handles many philosophical themes, such as determinism, existentialism, absurdism and ethics. Despite it being a philosophical novel, it is also a romantic novel that handles themes such as obsessive love and despair. The depressing theme is also very apparent in this novel through extreme loneliness and the feeling of having nothing to live for. Korkees tries to create a new school of thought that mixes the concepts of existentialism and absurdism into one philosophy: existentialist absurdism[2]. Displacement is also a theme that is apparent in this novel, seeing that Joseph, de facto, belongs nowhere and has no home.
See also[edit]
External links[edit]
Letters Of The Observer on Goodreads
Letters Of The Observer on Google Books
References[edit]
- ↑ Korkees, Kamal (2023). Letters Of The Observer. The Netherlands. pp. 236–237. ISBN 9798867252977. Search this book on
- ↑ Korkees, Kamal (2023). Letters Of The Observer. The Netherlands. pp. 235–236. ISBN 9798867252977. Search this book on
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