Review: "Anatomy of Disappearance"

By Nilima Sinha

Hisham Matar’s second novel, Anatomy of Disappearance, is a dream-like story of Nuri Pasha and his mixed-up emotions. Nuri lost his mother when he was 10. Nuri’s father, Kamal Pasha, is a political activist, a dissident with a home in Cairo. He is a descendent of Arab silk merchants.  He is wealthy and stylish.  When Nuri is 14 his father remarries a dazzling, beautiful woman named Mona.  Nuri is infatuated by Mona from the moment he spots her in a yellow bathing suit by the Magda Marina hotel pool in Alexandria where Nuri and Kamal are vacationing.  Nuri is jealous of his father’s newfound love and happiness.  He is resentful when he is sent off to boarding school in Yorkshire.   Suddenly Kamal is abducted while he is spending the night with a lover in Geneva. He vanishes without a trace, leaving Mona and Nuri in turmoil. Nuri sets out to learn more about his lost father and uncovers some of his 

---

 secrets. The story moves with Nuri from Cairo to London to Geneva and various places in between.

Matar’s language is chiseled and elegant as he describes Nuri’s efforts to develop an intimacy with his father after his mother’s death and his longing for his father after his disappearance.  In searing, sensual prose, Matar delves into Nuri’s relationships with the women in is life: his mother, his stepmother, and their family maid Naima. The story told from the point of an adolescent has an Arabian talelike quality and is a compelling work of fiction exposing the gruesome wrongs which are sometimes inflicted upon innocent bystanders.

There are several autobiographical elements in this novel.  Matar was born in New York City to Libyan parents.  He spent his childhood in Tripoli and Cairo and now lives in London and New York.   His father, Jaballa Matar, a prominent opponent of the Qaddafi regime was kidnapped while living in exile in Cairo and is still missing. Much of Matar’s writing deals with absence and loss.
​
The book is not currently a part of the Coffman Library’s collection.  In the meantime, if you are interested in the author our library does own Matar’s My Friends. Look for it in the Fiction section shelved under the author’s last name.