Up Close And Personal With Camilla Gibb

Writing From the Heart
How often do we get to meet well-known authors from abroad to share an informal evening with?
We get to learn about them as writers. As talented individuals, as artistes. What inspires them, touches and moves them to write the books they have written. Whether they be about life and humanity. Or love and war.
Last evening (Tuesday,March 27 2007), we shared a quiet session - "The Fiction of Truth and the Truth of Fiction" -- with Canadian author and socio-anthropologist Camilla Gibb at the National Press Club.

She talked about her life, her country, her work and her third book, "Sweetness in the Belly".
It was informal with only about 15 people there. A wonderful evening where we got up close and personal with her. No barriers.

Camilla's earlier books are "Mouthing the Words" (1999) and "The Petty Details Of So-and-So's Life" (2002). "Sweetness in the Belly" was published in 2005.

I find "Sweetness in the Belly' intriguing and compelling, not least for the style she employs, but how she is able to write convincingly about deep and serious issues facing a Muslim woman.
And the richness in the vivid images she conjures of Ethiopia.
Her narrations are powerful, yet gentle.
And the fact that a non-Muslim dared touch on Sufism, politics, Islam and the love and intrigues of a Muslim woman, is amazing.
It is quite rare indeed.
But after listening to her I am not surprised that she managed to"pull" off such a delicate stunt.
She is honest and sensitive. And she wrote from her heart.
She did not set out trying to change the world's misperception or misconception of Islam. But if along the way she did, she is thankful and happy.
Does she hope that more people will see the messages in the book.
"Insyallah," she said, without an awkward intonation.

Camilla never had any misgivings about writing fiction on a complex subject a great many non-Muslim westerners would stay clear of.

But she was not sure of how it would be received.

"I wonder if my audience ever care. As a writer you don't make any assumption of anyone caring or not."

Camilla said she was surprised by the reception the book received.

"Maybe I had underestimated...but it shows that there is huge hunger and appetite for the subject I had written on.

"And it shows that we've got a lot of caring people who knew they were manipulated by the media and who want a more accurate portrayal of truth."

Camilla said the book was written before 9/11. It was based on her experience while she was in
Ethiopia doing her PhD research in anthropology.
After writing her academic piece, she felt empty as though there was something she had not completed. She was compelled to write.
"I saw many things. I met many people during my stay in Ethiopia. There were stories to tell. And I needed to tell them," she said.
More compelling was an experience she had earlier in her life when she met a woman from Palestine.
She had asked the stranger "where do you come from?" which is really the usual greeting in Canada which is so multi-cultural. A country of immigrants.
That experience of getting to know the stranger so different from her showed how shallow was her "sense of place".

Camilla developed an interest in Islam. In fact the book was inspired by her Ethiopian experience and the Quran.

She recalled how her friends were shocked when she wanted to write the book.

They had asked her how she could dare represent a Muslim experience when she was not a Muslim.

"Can anyone represent someone different from them?" Camilla asked.

But why shouldn't she try?

Well-meaning friends asked her: "Aren't you afraid of being fatwa-ed?"

In a way, she said, writing the book was the risk she took.

I find it fascinating that she included a "sufi" as one of her characters, and a sufi shrine.

I am familiar with sufi shrines because when I was a little girl in Singapore (where I was born), there was one to which Muslims would go to fulfil vows or to pray for miracles.

It was called "Keramat Habib Noh".

Camilla has enough intimate knowledge about Islam, including sufism, to confidently write about it.

Besides, the lady reads the poems and writings of A-Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet and mystic.

I don't know how many authors like Camilla read Rumi whose works I love.

Didn't I say I like Camilla?

Here's a bit on Camilla's background:

Born in England, she moved to Canada at a young age. She decided to study anthropology and became interested in the Middle East.
She then spent time in Cairo, and furthered her education (a PhD from Oxford) by living in Ethiopia for a few years, studying Muslim practices in Africa.

To date, Camilla's novels have been published in 19 countries and translated into 15 languages. She has also written a number of short stories, articles and reviews. She was the 1999 winner of the Hart House Literary Contest and the 2001 winner of the CBC Literary Award for short story. She has been Writer-in-Residence at the University of Toronto and the University of Alberta and is the Vice President of PEN Canada.

About "Sweetness in the Belly" :

Lily, daughter of a British "hippie"couple in Ethiopia was raised at a Sufi shrine under mystical Islam, after the death of her parents. She takes us to many places where we get glimpses of her childhood, her adulthood, her love and her life as a Muslim in the wake of the Ethiopian revolution and as a Muslim in non-Muslim surrounding when she moves to England. Her voice is gentle but powerful.

"Sweetness in the Belly" was shortlisted for the Giller Prize, won Ontario's Trillium Book Award, was chosen as a Best Book of the Year by the Globe and Mail and is on the longlist for the 2007 IMPAC Award.
" The Petty Details of So-and-So's Life" was a national bestseller in Canada, and was chosen by the Globe and Mail as one of the "Best Books of the Year".

(Photo above, courtesy Ahirudin Attan of Camilla with NST journalist Koh Lay Chin (left) and this blogger.)