The post-colonial novels of Desmond Stewart and Ethel Mannin

Abstract

In presenting their characters and political ideologies, Desmond Stewart (1924–81) and Ethel Mannin (1900–84) are both unique among British fiction writers because they offered different portrayals of the post-colonial Arab world than what was mostly found in Western mainstream writings. While Stewart discussed the postcolonial era in Iraq by focusing on pan-Arab national movements that rejected the British hegemony during the monarchical period, Mannin focused on the postcolonial era which followed the British occupation and was represented in the Palestinian national movements. This paper argues that Stewart and Mannin offered a more complex and diverse view of the Arab world that was far different from many other stereotypical fictional depictions. It deals more in depth with the following novels: Stewart's Leopard in the Grass (London: W. J. Pollock, 1951) and A Stranger in Eden or The Unsuitable Englishman (New York: Signet, 1954), as well as Mannin's The Road to Beersheba (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1963) and The Night and Its Homing (London: Hutchinson, 1966).