“Home is where your absence is felt, the echo of your voice kept alive, no matter how long you have been away or how far you may have stayed, a place that still beats with the pulse of your heart.”
“(…) immigrants don’t die of existential fatigue or nihilistic boredom; they die from working too hard.”
There Are Rivers In The Sky by Elif Shafak has become one of my favourite reads this year and definitely one of my beloved books of all time. This beautifully crafted novel tells multiple stories of protagonists from different parts of the world, spanning centuries, all connected by a single drop of water which “has no regards for social status and royal titles”. This novel’s main focus is on marginalised communities, the meaning of water and the interconnectedness beyond the frontiers of history, time and geography. There Are Rivers In The Sky explores the history and persecution of the Yazidi minority in the Middle East over the centuries, the meaning of the oldest poem in the history, The Book of Gilgamesh and its impact on the culture, the attitudes towards mental health in the Ancient Mesopotamia and Victorian London, poverty and its impact on people’s choices and opportunities in life, environmental destruction in the name of progress including the hidden rivers in the major cities, the right to the artifacts and who owns the objects of the historical and cultural significance and illegal international trade in the antiquities from the Ancient Mesopotamia.
Below you can see a few pictures taken by me at the British Museum of the ancient Mesopotamian tablets with the cuneiform written on them.
The richness of the Yazidi culture
It allows the readers to discover the beauty and richness of the Yazidi culture and traditions that for centuries have been transmitted throughout songs, poems, folk tales, myths and legends:
“Stories and poems and ballads seem to be the mortar that keeps them [the Yazidis] together, keeps them alive.”
It is important to note that the Yazidi oral heritage has a deep significance; their tales and stories often carry the memories of the past atrocities, oppression and massacres that they have suffered at the hands of the Muslim rulers since the 12th century. The Yazidi community has been attacked and forcefully converted many times over the centuries; their numbers remain small compared to other communities in the region. The Yazidis used to be called devil-worshippers due to poor understanding of who are the Yazidis and where they come from. Many Muslims in the Middle East believed that they are the descendants of Yazid, the Tyrant of Karbala, who killed Muhammad’s grandson – but this has nothing to with the Yazdis. The ‘Yazid’ means “a descendant of God” and their roots go back to the Ancient Mesopotamia.
Through their history, the Yazidis have experienced systematic violence and the severe Islamic persecution as well as the Arabisation first by the Ottomans and then by the regime of Saddam Hussain in the 20th century Iraq.
“For us [Yazidis], memory is all we have. If you want to know who you are, you need to learn the stories of your ancestors. Since time immemorial, the Yazidis have been misunderstood, maligned, mistreated. Ours is a history of pain and persecution. Seventy – two times we have been massacred. The Tigris turned red with our blood, the soil dried up with our grief – and they still haven’t finished hating us.”
Through the stories in There Are Rivers In The Sky we learn so much about the Yazidi’s beliefs, traditions, and the centuries of persecution they suffered. According to the Yazidi beliefs, they descended from Adam alone with no involvement of Eve. Traditionally, the Yazidi women wear tattoos made from soot, ash and milk. Drawing patters on the face – deq – used to be common among the Yazidi women but these days the custom is fading. Some have stars or moons or suns tattooed on their chins. Narin’s grandmother, Besma has three wedge shaped vertical marks on her forehead – which carries the meaning of water and which is the same tattoo like Besma’s own grandmother, Leila had whom Arthur met during his visit to the ancient Mesopotamia during 1870s. Years later Narin will notice a similar tattoo on the arm of Nen, Zaleekhah’s friend when they will come to Castrum Kefa, Narin’s place of birth to take her to London. This tattoo so present in the Yazidi culture for centuries will become a source of trust and hope for a better future for one of the protagonists in the novel. Tattoo is presented also a part of storytelling, rather than of a rebellion.
Every Yazidi will come back to earth at least seven times. Whenever there is a memorial gathering, it is an elder female who must lead the way.” Mourning is a woman’s job – and so is remembrance.” There are cycles in nature and history – called dewr. Khider is an important protective spirit for the Yazidis, a patron of travellers, learners and lovers.
One of the concepts in the Yazidi culture depicted in the book is axirete – “the next world” which means that “every Yazidi, wherever they might be in the world, should have a spiritual brother or sister. (…) The sibling – not by blood but by heart – had to be a trustworthy companion both in this life and the aftermath.”
In There Are Rivers In The Sky the ancient history and heritage of Mesopotamia is intertwined with the present times:
“An unwavering pendulum swings between day and night. Light and shadow. Good and bad. Perhaps it is the same with past and present – they are not completely distinct. They bleed into each other.”
Meaning of the Book of Gilgamesh
The presence of the Book of Gilgamesh, the earliest recorded tale in the history, the oldest surviving poem is felt throughout all the multilayered stories in the novel, and it highlights the importance of keeping stories, tales of the marginalised communities alive. It is important to remember that the Epic of Gilgamesh had been forgotten until the cuneiform Mesopotamian tablets were rediscovered in 1872 by George Smith [on whom the main protagonist of the novel, Arthur is based] in one of the collections at the British Museum, originally excavated in the Library of Ashurbanipal in Nineveh by Austen Henry Layard and Hormuzd Rassam in the 1850s. The Epic of Gilgamesh was codified in the cuneiform tablets around 1750 BCE and tells the adventures of the flawed hero, Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king of Uruk who has been referenced by many writers and artists across the globe throughout the 20th century. The Epic of Gilgamesh presents uncertainty and its narrative mirrors the complex world and unfair society. There Are Rivers In The Sky allows us to find a sanctuary to retreat to in the tales of the Ancient Mesopotamia.
Attitudes to Mental Health in the Ancient Mesopotamia and Victorian London
The novel also has at its centre the lives of people struggling with mental health problems, for whom any feasible support and help is often connected to theirs and their family’s social status. This is clearly depicted in the character of Arabella, Arthur’s mother in the novel who lived during the Victorian London. Also, the Mesopotamian tablets include the rituals in relation to depression and mental health. The Ancient Mesopotamians had such a rich and diverse vocabulary describing emotions: ashushtu – distress, puluhtu – people who are constantly worried, nissatu – grief, sinit temiis – the alteration of the mind, severe panic attacks or hip libbi – the malady of melancholy, literally meaning “shattering of the heart”.
Poverty and its Impact on People’s Choices and Opportunities
Shafak highlights the living conditions of people below the poverty, depicting how their choices when it comes to education and professional opportunities are limited due to their social status and financial circumstances. In the novel the life of the main protagonist, Arthur is that of destitution and deprivation. When as an adult Arthur travels to the land of Gilgamesh he sees many destitute villages on his way to Nineveh; he immediately recognises that level poverty which is “a nation with no borders, and he is no foreigner in it but a native son”. During his younger years one of the main characters he owes only one set of smart clothes that he makes sure that is always freshly aired. Furthermore, his family shares one cramped room with three others, the walls are stained with dirt. Arthur often has to sleep in his clothes as he worries, they might be stolen at night. He only can take a bath using the same water that his mother and father used previously. During his visit to the 1851 Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nation Arthur’s poverty affects his experience there as he is unable to pay for treats or even use new modern toilets as it costs a penny that he cannot afford. Living in poverty means that being presentable according to the social norms takes an enormous effort for people like Arthur which affects his social interactions as well as opportunities presented to him.
“If poverty were a place, a hostile landscape into which you were deliberately pushed or accidently stumbled, it would be an accursed forest – a damp and gloomy wildwood suspended in time. (…) Even when you manage to cut down one obstacle, instantly it is replaced by another. (…) Poverty saps your will, little by little.”
Descriptions of life in London of the 19th century for the poorest are harrowing; the stench of rubbish and stale urine is everywhere. During the Victorian times (1820 – 1914) it was common for children to work in factories and shipyards.
Environmental Destruction in the name of the Progress
There Are Rivers In The Sky addresses the issue of the environmental crisis throughout the history. Shafak explores the issues of nature versus progress: “All too often, we humans destroy nature and call it progress”. The lands of the ancient civilisation on the shores of the Tigris and the Euphrates that are currently home to many nations are the most water-stressed places in the world. As the waters of the rivers dry up, the ancient settlements emerge from beneath their shores. Seven out of ten most water stressed nations are currently situated in the Middle East. The lands of Mesopotamia once had the most advanced cities, lush urban centres with rich soil that could have sustained many generations but the abuse of natural resources and wars for dominance led to the decline of the cities, famine, flood and drought which turned these lands into the sand dunes. Castrum Kefa as know during the Assyrian times and now called Hasankeyf, one of the oldest human settlements where one of the protagonists is born and the other one finds his resting place becomes a part of the land marked for a major dam building by the Turkish government which will be called Ilisu Dam resulting in eighty thousand people being displaced. “Its limestone cliffs and man-made caves, its unexplored historical sites and unplumbed secrets, will disappear under an artificial lake.” A 12,000 year old history will be obliterated by a dam that will last 50 years. Most local population have migrated to cities. People across the region from every religion and sect have been affected by the construction of the dam. Especially for the Yazidi community which is small in numbers being relocated means the fear of discrimination and persecution. At the time of the story, there are only twelve Yazidis left in the village. The new dam means that their land soon will be flooded in the name of progress. This is something that the Yazidis also experienced under Saddam’s regime when the Yazidi settlements were wiped out off when he ordered the removal of the Yazidi villages to make way for the 1980s Mosul Dam which has now been declared the most perilous dam in the world built on poor karst foundation resulting in dissolving every day.
History shows that people have rarely showed the appreciation for nature, often they ignored it. During the Victorian times people had not cared about water until it became a taker when “between 1853 and the last months of 1854, more than 10750 Londoners died from the blue terror [cholera]” which was the consequence of dumping rubbish into the Thames. The main London river was used for everything that was unwanted which caused heavy pollution of its waters. Those in power did not understand that the river is both a giver of life and a taker of life which resulted in deaths of many Londoners, mostly from the poorest neighbourhoods.
Hidden Rivers
There Are Rivers In The Sky also touches on the topic of the hidden rivers in the various cities around the world. The Bievre River used to be an important waterway until the 19th century when it became polluted by human activities. As a result, this river was buried under Paris and forgotten for a long time. Tokyo used to be the city of water with more than a hundred streams and canals that were covered and used as a base for roads or just hidden under pavements. Athens used to have three rivers that were buried under layers of concrete. London has the River Fleet, the largest of London subterranean rivers which has been buried for over 250 years. The are other hidden rivers in London: the Effra in south London, the Tyburn, the Wallbrook and the Westbourne. Seoul successfully managed to do “daylighting” which means returning a lost river to the open air. In her novel Shafak discusses the impact “burying” the rivers have on the environment for decades to come.
Right to the Artifacts and Who Owns the Objects of the Historical and Cultural Significance
As one of its themes There Are Rivers In The Sky explores the right of communities to keep the artifacts that are part of their history and cultural heritage. Shafak poses nuanced questions as to whether the artifacts have one specific belonging. Museums can protect and display the object of historical and cultural heritage but also in deciding what will be remembered the museums can take part in deciding which parts of history will be forgotten. The issue of what has the paramount importance is also discussed within the novel: the ownership or who is in a better position to appreciate and protect the historical heritage? Many of the artifacts of Nineveh ended up in the private homes only for the display of the wealthy and privileged ones where the people of Mesopotamia would never have a chance to see these objects. In the novel Arthur had initially believed that he was rescuing these artifacts from obscurity, but the reality was more complex and nuanced. As in the case of the tablets of Nineveh, one could argue that the tablets belong to“the ghosts of the past”. The complexities related to the objects of cultural and historical significance are explored in the novel through the history of the British Museum and the story of Arthur who as mentioned earlier was based on the real person called George Smith (1840-1876), the working-class genius, a self-taught Assyriologist who decoded the cuneiform and translated the Epic of Gilgamesh. George Smith also authored numerous books such as Assyrian Discoveries: An Account of Explorations and Discoveries on the site of Nineveh, during 1873 and 1874 and The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
In his life George extensively travelled across the Ottoman Empire. His commitment to his passion and the ancient world led to his premature death. He passed away of dysentery in Aleppo during one of the expeditions to excavate the Library of Ashurbanipal.
Below you can see more pictures taken by me at the British Museum of the ancient Mesopotamian tablets with some of them having the cuneiform written on them. Also, above you can see the copy of one of the speeches about his findings in the Mesopotamia in the early 1870s.
“To whom does the object belong – the itinerant bards who recited the poem, travelling from city to city; the king who ordered it to be put in writing; the scribe who laboured in setting it down; the librarian who scrupulously stored it; the archaeologists who unearthed it centuries later; the museum that will keep it safe – or does it belong only to the people of this land, and , if so, will minorities like the Yazidis ever be counted amongst them?”
International Trade in the Artifacts
Elif Shafak also addresses the scale of international trade in the antiquities by Islamic State which brought them enormous profit. Despite videos circulating of them tearing down statues, vandalizing libraries, they used the Ancient Mesopotamian artifacts to gain profit. The collectors across the world are so eager to get these artifacts that they ignore massacres that led the fanatics to get these objects of the historical and cultural heritage. These objects end up in the house so private buyers in the major cities in the world. This is a part of cycle: “demand increase theft, theft increases demand.” In the novel, Zaleekhah’s uncle who is originally from the lands of Ancient Mesopotamia wants to buy a tablet form the Ashurbanipal Library. He reassures Zaleekhah that this tablet came from a reputable dealer but in reality, this is not true.
I cannot recommend this book enough. I had such a hard time in my personal life when I was reading this book and it helped me so much to find a refuge in the stories of Arthur, Zaleekhah, Narin, and the Ancient Mesopotamia -present day Iraq, parts of Turkey, Iran, Syria and Kuwait. During the weeks when I was reading this novel I visited the British Museum every Friday evening to look at the artifacts from Nineveh. I sat there for as long as I could and read The Rivers in The Sky having the artifacts from Nineveh in the corner of my sight.
This book warmed my heart, calmed my mind and soul; it inspired me and showed me how healing the stories can be. This book brought me so much joy as a reader, introduced me to the beauty of the Yazidi culture and the ancient history as well as to wonderful characters, especially Arthur who felt so relatable to me when it comes to his personality, traits and character as well as many of his existential struggles. His life was coloured by his love for words; in his youth he spent time on publishing and arranging books, deciphering the ancient tablets of Nineveh and devoting himself to translating the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh. In my heart Arthur will remain one of my ultimate literary heroes and I am eager to learn more about George Smith whose life was enriched by the stories of the Ancient Mesopotamia. In her note to the reader, Elif Shafak said that she used George’s diary entries he had kept until his death to create the character of Arthur. It makes my heart warm to think that there was once a man walking this earth who was a little bit like Arthur in the novel.
Historical Facts in There Are Rivers In The Sky
Another interesting feature of There Are Rivers In The Sky is that many characters and events depicted in the novel are based on the real events recorded in the books, diaries, various documents and journals. Charles Dickens makes his appearance in the novel visiting Bradbury & Evans where Arthur works and in real life he was actually published by Bradbury & Evans but just a few decades earlier. The scene where Arthur sees Constantinople, a present-day Istanbul for the first time was inspired by the descriptions of the city by the 19th century Italian writer Edmundo de Amicis in his 1877 non-fiction travelogue. Shafak also used a real letter from the Secretary of the British Museum with small amendments for the literary purposes. As mentioned earlier the diary entries by George Smith were also used by Shafak as a reference. The scene where the religious judge gives permission to deceive and slaughter the Yazidis because they are not “people of the book” is based on the account of the 19th century archaeologist already mentioned Austen Henry Layard, the author of Nineveh and Its Remains, published in 1854 by Bradbury & Evans, the very book that Arthur saw on the desk of a teacher and which sparked his curiosity in the Yazidis and the Ancient Mesopotamia; this is the same book that another protagonist of the novel, Zaleekhah saw on her uncle Malik’s desk in 2018. The reference to the genocide of the Yazidis in the 19th century by the shores of the river Tigris is a historical fact with Shafak changing its date for the literary purposes. The genocide was conducted by Muhammad Pasha of Rawanduz along with Bedir Khan Beg who in 1832 massacred 70,000 Yazidis. The persecution of the Yazidis has been going on since the 12th century. The genocide of the Yazidis between 2014 and 2017 by Islamic State happened in front of the entire world. The atrocities committed against the Yazidis were classified as genocide by UN, a vast majority of Western countries and human right institutions. Genocide refers to acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, religious or racial group. Testimonies of the Yazidi survivors of the Islamic State were also used by Elif Shafak in her novel. Just recently a Yazidi woman was rescued from her captors in Gaza; she has been missing for almost ten years. She was kidnapped aged 11 in Iraq by the Islamic State group and was subsequently taken to Gaza and after more than a decade in captivity she was finally rescued by the Israeli Defence Forces from her captors in Gaza at the end of 2024. Today there are still thousands of Yazidi women and children missing, many of them kept captive and as slaves in typical family homes across Middle East. The local population is aware there are the Yazidi slaves in the home of bustling Turkish cities as well as in the cities of Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt and Gaza. Shafak also addresses the issue of the Yazidis being used by the Islamic State for illegal organ trade with the worldwide reach.
The Ancient Mesopotamia in The Are Rivers In The Sky
There Are Rivers In The Sky starts in Nineveh, “lush with perfumed gardens, bubbling fountains, and irrigation canals” where “water is both the harbinger of life and the messenger of death”. Nineveh was the ancient capital of the Assyrian Empire situated on the eastern bank on the Tigris which in the year 640 BCE was the world’s largest city with 175,000 inhabitants. Sennacherib (704-681 BC), Ashurbanipal’s grandfather, chose Nineveh as the capital city of the Assyrian empire.The walls of the city were over ten kilometers long, with huge ditches in front of them. Water for parks and orchards was brought by the complex irrigation system from the Zagros mountains, located as far as eighty kilometers away from Nineveh.The administrative heart of the city of the South-West Palace. There was also a nature reserve with exotic plants and animals. During his time thousands of slaves were used to build this city along with its grand canals and irrigation system. History books often remember the achievement of the Assyrians but there is always a forgotten side to this; namely the number of lives lost during the construction of this irrigation system. Nineveh was destroyed in 612 BC by the king of Babylon in alliance with the Iranian forces. To put the history of Nineveh in the context of the times, the First Olympic Games took place in 776 BC, the Foundation of Rome occurred in 754 BC and the Early Iron Age took place between 680 BC and 609 BC.
This is also Mesopotamia with the Librarian King, Ashurbanipal (685-631 BC) under whose reign (669-631 BC) the region was turned into a powerful nation. Ashurbanipal was learned and educated but equally cruel like his predecessors. The library was his favourite part of the Palace and would become his legacy for the future generations. The Library of Ashurbanipal was flanked with two statutes: hybrid creatures – half human half animals called lamassus who were considered protective spirits by the Assyrians and are present in the stories of the protagonists in the novel. We learn about the ancient Mesopotamian mythology including Nisaba, the goddess of storytelling who was imagined in the deepest shade of blue, whose name was consigned to oblivion due to its feminine nature – one of the tablets is dedicated to Nisaba in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the poem that had been recited across Mesopotamia, Anatolia, Persia and the Levant for centuries. The Temple of Eresh known as Esagin or House of Lapis Lazuli was dedicated to Nisaba. In the time of Hammurabi of Babylon (1792-1750 BC), Nisaba was stripped of her powers. The King believed that writing and stories needed a masculine patron and Nabu became an official custodian of storytellers. Nisaba retreats into the shadows and writing is no longer regarded as a suitable occupation for women.
Ashurbanipal knew entire poem of Gilgamesh by heart which brought joy into his life and at the same time he was conducting massacres, plunders, demolitions from the safety of his reading chamber. Ashurbanipal’s destruction of Elam in 648 BC is considered as a genocide. There Are Rivers In The Sky provides us with a lesson of not putting people of power on the pedestal regardless of how educated they are. Throughout the history there are many examples of leaders, both men and women who were responsible for the most abhorrent crimes of cruelty and were well-read, cultured, worldly at the same time. Empathy cannot always be learned.
The ancient Mesopotamians are known for inventing writing, mathematics, astronomy, irrigation and the wheel. Shafak also reminds us that they could be defined as “the first ones to experience the pain of losing a motherland”. Mesopotamia was also the land of scholars like Al-Jazari (1136–1206), often considered the father of robotics who was fascinated by water and built five machines for raising water, invented a hand washing automaton, a peacock machine and a flush mechanism. He authored The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices in 1206. Depending on whom you ask Al-Jazari was an Arab, Persian or Kurd but noone asks the Yazdis if he was one of them.
Meaning of Water and Interconnectedness between the Protagonists in There Are Rivers In The Sky
There Are Rivers In The Sky starts with one single drop of rain ensconced in the king’s hair, a drop “inconsequential though it may be compared with the magnitude of the universe, (…), it holds the secret of infinity, story uniquely its own.” Life on earth without water would not be possible, water is not linear molecule – it is a bent molecule. “If water were linear, there would be no life on earth.” It is a reminder of the intricacies and complexities when it comes to human life and connections. H20 – an atom of oxygen with two atoms of hydrogen attached to it is like Arthur playing the role of oxygen and Zaleekhah and Narin are two atoms of hydrogen – all connected across times and places. None of them can exist without the other two.
Narin is one of the protagonists in the story taking place in 2014 and the subsequent years in the novel. She, her grandmother Besma and her great-grandmother, Leila come from the long line of the Yazidi healers, treating those afflicted by anxiety and depression by using water to cure melancholy. Besma believes that two drops of water are like “an invisible thread that connects those who are destined to meet.” When her story starts, Narin is nine years old and suffers from rare genetic condition which will result in her becoming deaf. Her father is a qanun player, the same qanun that Arthur, other protagonist of the novel living in the 19th century, gifted Narin’s great-grandmother, Leila in Zerav. At the beginning of their story, Narin, her father and her grandmother, Besma live in previously mentioned Castrum Kefa, one of the oldest human settlements, which is also called these days Hasankeyf. It is the place that will connect all three protagonists together in the 21st century and where one cycle of life, history and nature will end and the next one will begin.
Zaleekhah is another protagonist, a London-born woman in her 30s working as a hydrologist in the 2018 London, with her family roots in Nineveh. She often feels like an outsider, tired of surviving. She is often baffled that there are just a few scientists who study water – the molecule older than the solar system itself, and still biggest mystery to our life on earth.
Arthur Smyth, one of the main protagonists of the novel was born to Arabella in 1840’s London slum tenement when the city was the most crowded urban space in the world. Shafak contrasts the experience of Arthur’s birth with the wealthy and privileged dwellings of Queen Victoria who was giving birth to her first daughter in a cosy chamber inside Buckingham Palace at the same time. Throughout her entire life Arabella is overwhelmed by constant worries about her son’s future, finances, not being able to afford to feed herself and her baby. She has to “tolerate” the abuse at the hands of her husband. Arthur’s mother suffers most probably from depression but during the Victorian times any malady of mind was called “an excessive sentimentality – a quintessentially female condition”. Arthur believes that if only his mother could eat and not be cold and would have her own room and no worries about money, she would be cured. Arabella’s poverty she was born into caused her severe mental health problems resulting in her being confined to the institution later in life – her fate was shared by many female contemporaries of hers. The novel shows us that mental health problems caused by mistreatment, social status, poverty were common in the ancient times as well as in the 19th century and in the contemporary modern societies.
“Arthur prefers to bury himself in the folds of distant history, anywhere but here and now. He feels closer to the people of the past than those of the present, more at peace with ghosts than the living. (…) the one thing that remains constant is the acute loneliness that he carries everywhere with him, a solitude that never leaves his side, the one companion that drives all others away. “
As for Arthur he has many neurodiverse traits which became his blessing and his curse at the same. He has an extraordinary memory with strong affinity for numbers, languages, patterns, justice and truth. Arthur also can tell which day of the week was just by the date., shares a great sense of wonder and curiosity; the more bizarre the better. Arthur thrives on the predictability of daily routine, solving mathematical problems or reading about the history and learning something new. He often is misunderstood by others and treated unjustly, and he is very much aware of this. His interest in the Yazidis grows over time as he feels that he and the Yazidis have something in common, they seem to be judged on the assumptions of others, often misunderstood and mistreated.
Furthermore, he is very sensitive and is able to notice injustices in his surroundings; he feels an immense sadness and lack of fairness when he sees the headmaster of his school for the deprived children surrounded by the luxury; he is always very aware of not adding to his mother’s anxieties as much as it is possible. Arthur does not like confrontation – “if only he could live without hurting and without ever getting hurt.” There is no limit to Arthur’s inquisitive mind. He has attention to the smallest detail and is very considerate towards others. He does not like crowds; he often does calculations to calm his racing heart when he is overwhelmed. Arthur can never tell whether people mean what they say. He finds it difficult to detect sarcasm.
As previously mentioned during Arthur’s times many children in Victorian Britain had to work in shipyards, factories, coal mines, or as chimney cleaners. Young Arthur also had to find employment. His father managed to help him secure a job at the publishing house called Bradbury & Evans, the same publisher responsible for publishing Nineveh and Its Remains by Austen Henry Layard that sparked Arthur’s and Zaleekhah’s interest in the Yazidis at the different times. Becoming an apprentice at the leading printing and publishing company was one luck that would then change Arthur’s life forever. At his job he is exposed to books by writers like Omar Khayyam, Tennyson, Goethe, Dickens, Bronte, Jane Austen, William Thackeray, John Locke, David Hume, John Stuart Mill, Baruch Spinoza, Darwin, Lord Byron, Samuel Coleridge, Alfred de Musset, Schiller, Hugo, Tolstoy, Frederick Douglass, about painters Francisco Goya, Eugene Delacroix, William Blake. Days spent at the publishing house would become the happiest of his life even though he only comes to understand this once those days at the publishing house are gone:
“One always begins to forgive a place as soon as it is left behind.”
At the age of 14 he attends the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations that was opened in 1851 in Hyde Park. That experience of seeing “a massive vase from Sweden, a suit of Cossack armour, a malachite urn from Russia, a ceramic jar from Portugal, optical instruments from France made him exhilarated”. He realises that the world is immense, and the life he has experienced so far is “a mere speck in the spectrum of possibilities and destinies available to human beings. Beyond the shores of the River Thames, there are other capitals, old and modern.” During that visit after seeing of one of the lamassus that was on loan from the British Museum Arthur promises to himself to make his way to Nineveh one day. He feels close affinity with the lamassus – “lonely and lost in this grinding city as he has been all his life”. Following his visit to the Great Exhibition Arthur starts visiting the British Museum almost during every lunch break. It takes him eighteen minutes to get to the museum form his printing job which leaves him with fourteen minutes to spare at the museum. During these fourteen minutes he studies the marks on the Mesopotamian tablets of Nineveh. This is his new cherished routine which makes him less nervous.
“With a final glance at the treasures of Nineveh, the boy hastens to leave the room. He cannot explain to the man, not even to himself, but an odd excitement has taken hold of his heart. (…) He is certain that what he has seen is a system of writing. (…) he stops in front of the tablets, stock-still, as if he were a statute himself, his face so close to the vitrines that his breath mists the surface of the glass.”
Below you can see the video I made during one of my visits to the British Museum where I focused on the Assyrian tablets including those from Nineveh – I hope this will give you a glimpse into the place that inspired the real George Smith and his ability to decipher the cuneiform. Thanks to him we can understand the Epic of Gilgamesh and the lives of the ancient Assyrians.
Arthur comes to conclusion that the cuneiform is not an alphabet but a collection of syllables and finds his calling:
“It is my duty to piece together what has been broken, to help people to remember what has been consigned to oblivion throughout the centuries, and to retrieve what has been lost somewhere along the way.”
Arthur is aware that someone like him has no prerogatives conferred by social connections and a private education – he cannot advance in the disciplines where the doors are already closed with exception of his knowledge of the ancient Mesopotamia and decoding the cuneiform which is one field where Arthur is on the equal footing with those around him; this restores his hope for the better future.
Over next years many things have changed in his life, but one thing remained constant which is his acute loneliness that has accompanied him everywhere and the tablets of Mesopotamia. By decoding the tablets, he learns stories of the kings, musicians, writers, poets and many others from the olden times. “It does not occur to him that we are drawn to the kind of stories that are already present within us.” Centuries later it will be Arthur’s story that would impact and connect Zaleekhah and Narin.
Later in his life Arthur is given the opportunity to travel to the land of Gilgamesh. On his way he first stops in the Ottoman Constantinople. While he is waiting for firman – a legal mandate or decree issued by the Ottoman officials to excavate in Nineveh, Arthur has to engage in the social encounters with the personnel at the British Embassy which he finds it difficult. He does not match their conversational style and as a result he feels uncomfortable within the walls of the embassy. On one occasion Arthur is invited to a dinner by the local Turkish family where he is offered ashure, Noah’s Ark pudding which was invented to celebrate surviving the Flood – yet another memory of water by which everything is connected in the novel. Those who have read other books by Elif Shafak will remember that the chapters in The Bastard of Istanbul are named afterthe ingredients to make ashure. This dessert has a huge cultural and historical significance in Turkey and Armenia.
During his time in Constantinople Arthur enjoys spending his time with the local fishermen who unlike the staff at the embassy do not engage in a small talk and feel comfortable in silence. Going from one neighbourhood to other feels like traveling to another country. A wide array of languages is spoken in the city: Turkish Greek, Armenian, Kurdish, Arabic, Persian, Ladino, French, English, Bosnian, Serbian, Albanian, Russian. He is mesmerized by the sublime sound of the qanun, the piano of the East whose origin goes back to the times of the ancient Mesopotamia; its sound consoled the Mesopotamians when they were lonely or heartbroken. This is the same qanun that he will then give to Leila, Narin’s great-grandmother and it will find its way to Narin’s father who would be playing the same qanun across the Middle East in the early 21st century. Once Arthur receives the Ottoman permission to look for the lost lines of the Epic of Gilgamesh in Nineveh, he embarks on a journey to Mosul and on his way, he sees the familiar images of poverty and destitution that bring the memories of his childhood in the Chelsea slums of London. Once in Mosul he has to deal with the local pashas whose coded communication is a constant struggle for Arthur. He overhears a conversation between the pasha and qadi talking about harming the local Yazidi community while sharing a sweet treat. They show a total indifference to the fate of the Yazidi community. While on his way to Nineveh, Arthur stops in the Yazidi village, Zerav. Decades later it is the same village where in 2014 Narin and her grandmother Besma stay while preparing for Narin’s baptism ceremony called Mor Kirin in the Valley of Lalish, the holiest temple of the Yazidi faith, “one place on earth where even the loneliest souls find solace”, located north of Mosul in Iraq.
Arthur feels very comfortable with the Yazidi community and is welcomed as their guest for as long as he wishes to. He finally reaches Nineveh where thousands years earlier a tiny drop of water fell on the head of King Ashurbanipal and in this exact place Arthur starts digging through the layers of time:
“There is something humbling about labouring at an archaeology excavation. (…) The border separating the present moment from the distant past dissolves and you find yourself tumbling into a vanished world that, though dead and buried, comes curiously to life. Your perceptions shift: you are made to realize the vulnerability of all that seems robust and majestic – palaces, aqueducts, temples – but, equally, the resilience of what appears small and insignificant – an ivory ring, a bronze coin, a wishbone… (….).”
Arthur feels humbled by the remains of Nineveh and becomes very contemplative pondering: “Where we are gone – what is left of us?” – the very same question that Narin’s grandmother, Besma asked herself centuries later. Over time Arthur becomes more familiar with the Yazidi rituals and traditions.
“When he arrived here, all he had imagined was that it was his responsibility to unearth antiquities and take them back to England. He wasn’t prepared for the sadness that keeps pecking at his breast like a vulture at a carcass. (…) He would wonder if it were preferable to live in innocence and die in ignorance instead.”
Arthur befriends a Yazidi woman called Leila, a diviner – a faqra, who can “detect things that others walk past without noticing. (…) a faqra learns things she wishes she never did and, once she does, she cannot unlearn them. (…) They [faqras] are the custodian of knowledge, the memories-keepers. In a culture where very little, if ever, is put into writing, they are the librarians.” Leila for whom Arthur develops deep feelings but buried them in his heart will become Narin’s great grandmother. Arthur understands that the Yazidis were unfairly mistreated and misunderstood not only by their Muslim neighbours but also by the Christians including the Westerners.
One of the already mentioned concepts in the Yazidi culture is axirete – “the next world” which means that “every Yazidi, wherever they might be in the world, should have a spiritual brother or sister. (…) The sibling – not by blood but by heart – had to be a trustworthy companion both in this life and the aftermath.” Leila’s next world’s sister lives in the previously mentioned city of Castrum Kefa, the Castle of Rock, one of the oldest settlements in history, the place where Narin and her grandmother will live in 2014, which will become Arthur’s resting place and a meeting place and connection for all three protagonists in the novel.
On his return to England his discoveries bring Arthur fame for which he is not prepared. He feels unsettled: “he does not know how to articulate this feeling of extreme loneliness and rootlessness that has descended upon him amongst his fellow countrymen. Strangely, he feels like a foreigner in his own homeland.” Arthur is longing for the Yazidi companionship and wishes to return to their homeland despite all the unfamiliarity. Four years later he goes back to Mesopotamia. During his visit to Zerav he finds out that the Yazidis were attacked by the Pasha of Mosul and not many survived. “Some fled towards Mount Judi and Tur Abdin, other towards Mount Sinjar but a larger group made for the River Tigris.” The atrocity happened in the land of the beautiful palaces of King Ashurbanipal and where Arthur was looking for the missing lines of the Epic of Gilgamesh:
“What happened in the village of Golden Waters will never be mentioned in history books, Only the grandchildren of the survivors will remember. It will remain unvoiced in their unfinished sentences, uneasy silences, resurfacing nightmares. The memory of the massacre will be carefully handed down from one generation to the next (…).”
Arthur does not understand why this bloodbath was not reported by any English newspaper – after all, this place is where the French, British, Finnish and German archaeologists had been excavating for a long time. He feels a deep sorrow and his worldview turns from certainty into doubt.
“Has he, in his fervour for uncovering the library of Ashurbanipal, failed to give the same respect or attention to the living as he has to the dead?”
“There is immense loneliness in his heart where there should have been intimacy. He carries within him desires suppressed; secrets withheld. Love is a puzzle in cuneiform, one he has not been able to solve. In truth, he has always been happiest when working on an ancient tablet. (…) [Arthur] recognizes that only when studying the past has, he felt at home, only when sorting broken shards has he felt complete.”
Arthur dies during his search of Leila. Following his death Leila finds him and buries him in Castrum Kefa, where she found a refuge following the atrocities committed against the Yazidi population in the 19th century. This city will become Narin’s place of birth in the 21st century.
Conclusion
It is where all three protagonists ‘meet’, Narin and Zaleekhah will visit Arthur’s grave under the oak tree in 2018. Arthur’s grave is overlooked by Leila’s grave. Following their visit to Castrum Kefa, this place will be flooded to make way for the mentioned earlier Ilisu dam. Culture, history and memories will be submerged in water giving a start to a new cycle of history and nature: dewr as in the Yazidi beliefs.
There Are Rivers In The Sky is an amazing book, its storytelling is so rich and full of empathy. Interconnectedness was depicted in such a nuanced and thought-provoking manner. For me this novel is therapeutic, a true sanctuary offering a retreat to the Storyland. Elif Shafak’s books always allow me to enter a different world to the one I inhabit and immerse myself completely in the richness of storytelling. Shafak knows how to speak about the darkest chapters of the history as well as the issues of complexity that require multitude of layers to understand them. I highly recommend this book and also seeking further resources to learn more about the Yazidis and the Ancient Mesopotamia.
Thanks to There Are Rivers In The Sky I discovered the world of wonder that I had never known it existed. As mentioned earlier I read this book during very sad and difficult times and immersing myself especially in the story of Arthur offered me much needed comfort and calmness.
