The Aesthetics of the First-Person Pronoun in Self-Fictionalization: Ibrahim al-Koni's Malakut Tatfilat al-Rab

Abstract

This first-person pronoun dominates the narrative of Ibrahim al-Koni's work, Malakut Tatfilat al-Rab (The Cosmic Autobiography in the Tongue of Silence). It serves as the cornerstone of its narration and one of the most fundamental structural elements upon which the discourse is built. We posit that it is a direct reference to the author, who declared this in the novel's very title. This places us before a literary genre that approaches autobiography, which critics have termed 'self-fictionalization.' In this mode, the self is dissolved and transformed—through a process of defamiliarization—into the position of the focal point. Consequently, the text deviates from the autobiographical pact, a result of its unique construction and the distinctive features of its discourse, which break from the conventions of traditional autobiographical writing.