Defying Kuwaiti censorship and addressing the crisis of intellectualism: Ḥāris saṭḥ al-ʿālam as a subversive feminine dystopian fairy tale

The “Arab Spring” posed a significant challenge to entrenched authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), disrupting the pursuit of freedom and democracy while exacerbating existing social and political crises. In its aftermath, contemporary Arabic literature saw a marked rise in dystopian novels that reflect on past revolutions and project a bleak future. This widespread revolutionary spirit also inspired marginalised groups in Kuwait, including censored writers. Against this backdrop, Kuwaiti author Buthayna al-ʿĪsa, in her 2019 work Ḥāris saṭḥ al-ʿālam (Guardian of the World Surface), weaves well-known Western fairy tale figures into a dystopian narrative set in a Middle Eastern context. Her use of estrangement – now a survival strategy for activists and intellectuals in Kuwait and across the Arab world post-“Arab Spring” – enables her to critique book censorship and the growing totalitarianism in Kuwait while skilfully avoiding censorship herself. Framing the narrative through a bookstore proprietress who both writes and participates in the story, Ḥāris saṭḥ al-ʿālam offers a nuanced portrayal of female characters, both within the narrative and as the storyteller, emphasising the subversive potential of Arab women to confront the Symbolic order and the crisis of intellectualism in the post-revolutionary era.