Zaina Arafat: On Humanity Versus Likability, Identity, Intergenerational Trauma and Her Debut Novel, YOU EXIST TOO MUCH
As a child of immigrants who has been raised in the United States, the protagonist of Zaina Arafat’s debut novel You Exist Too Much finds herself between the culture of her parents and the American culture she has been raised in. She wrestles with who she is as a person and who her mother expects her to be. Much like the protagonist of the novel moving back and forth between the Palestinian image of herself that her mother wishes to see and the American version that is still attempting to figure herself out, You Exist Too Much is told in vignettes that take you from the United States to the Middle East. Arafat’s novel explores a young girl’s progression into adulthood as she traverses the complicated landscape of growing up and trying to bridge a gap to a relationship with her mother.
I spoke with Zaina Arafat via email about the mother-daughter relationships, the protagonist’s journey to accepting herself, understanding one’s own identity, intergenerational trauma, and being caught between two cultures.
What was the writing process like for this book? How long did it take to write the book?
It took six years to write the book. So much of the process was trying to really get at the depths of this character, in all of her complexity, all of her intersecting and overlapping identities and characteristics. The book has an unconventional, non-linear narrative, and a large part of my process was figuring out its structure. I taped pages to the walls of my apartment in Iowa to figure how to arrange the scenes a way that artfully revealed the narrator's backstory and the impact of her past on her present self.
Do you have a writing routine you follow? Do you write in the morning, night?
I write best in the morning, when my brain is fresh. I usually wake up at six a.m, make coffee and head to my desk. I keep my phone off and I don’t check email or the news until nine a.m, so that I can block out all that noise and tap into my creative mind.
This book explores several different themes such as sexuality, parental relationships, religion, cultural identity, love addiction--was there a theme that you found more difficult to tackle than others?
They were all difficult to tackle, the main challenge came with weaving them together so that they interacted, to reveal how, taken together, they influenced and impacted each other and the narrator.
The narrator in the book is at times hard to like. You root for her and want her to succeed but she continues to be in her own way? Just when you think she is on a path to recovery she slips back into self-destructive behavior like destroying a relationship. When writing the book, what did you wish for readers to think of her?
I wanted to depict as realistically as possible what internalized homophobia could look like and how it could manifest, especially when it derives from cultural and family taboos. The narrator's likability wasn’t as much a priority to me as her humanity. I was most concerned with depicting internal shame and how it could lead to self-destructive behavior. I was often frustrated with her, I wanted her to make healthier choices, but I couldn’t force her, in the same way that you can’t force an alcoholic to stop drinking, they have to come to that decision on their own. I had empathy for her, and compassion, especially knowing that her behavioral patterns were largely shaped by past trauma. I hoped the reader would recognize this, that beneath her destructive behavior was a wounded heart and a desire to change, difficult as that was. Anytime she made a healthy and self-preserving decision, I felt proud of her.
We are never told what the narrator's name is - was this a conscious decision?
It was. One of her struggles is the feeling of taking up too much space, and her urge to self-negate through addiction, among other ways. Leaving her without a name, and with less presence on the page, spoke to that theme.
The narrator has a very flawed and complicated relationship with her mother. Her mother has been tough on her most of her life and doesn’t seem to accept her daughter the way she is yet you can tell she really loves her. How did you go about crafting the relationship? Is it something you yourself can relate to?
I wanted to depict an intergenerational relationship, and to show how trauma can trickle down from mother to daughter insofar as a mother’s trauma can impact how she treats her daughter. The narrator does love her mother very much, and that love goes both ways, though it's often miscommunicated and misconstrued. The love is shrouded in hurt, and this narrator’s quest is to understand her mother as a person, so that she can move through pain and arrive at empathy and compassion.
The destructive behavior and impulses that the narrator presents throughout the book seem to stem from her upbringing and the treatment she’s had to endure from her mother. Do you feel that through these actions she is seeking out some kind of love or attention she feels she lacked growing up? Or that she doesn’t feel she is worthy of having a comfortable and happy relationship?
Yes, I feel that she is seeking the love, attention and approval she was denied throughout her childhood, and that her actions are largely motivated by this. I also believe that she doesn’t feel worthy of having a comfortable and happy relationship because she’s been made to feel unworthy of such throughout her life. Such a thing is unfamiliar to her, and she seeks what she knows, as many of us do.
Throughout the book the narrator is caught between two things - different labels for her sexuality, two cultures American and Palestinian, the daughter she wishes to be and the daughter she is. The experience of being caught in between two different worlds is one that a lot of people can relate to. As someone who grew up between New York City and the Middle East, can you talk a little about your personal experience with this?
Being in between cultures and identities can be alienating, as you often feel you belong to neither of the two. At the same time, it gives you a unique perspective, the view from the in-between, and allows you to bring you encounters and observations from one realm to the other, enriching your experience in each.
The narrator's mother often tells her that “she exists too much.” How did you come up with this and what does it mean to you?
You Exist Too Much speaks to the mother’s feeling that her daughter does not belong to her, for reasons that go beyond just her sexuality. It also speaks to inhabiting spaces deemed unacceptable for this protagonist, culturally and sexually, to feel that you are flawed at the core of your being. On a macro level, it speaks to what it means to be Palestinian, to have your right to self-determination and statehood denied.
We are always curious as to what authors are reading. What are you currently reading?
I’m reading Fairest by Meredith Talusan and All My Mother’s Lovers by Ilana Masad—highly recommend both!
Zaina Arafat is a Palestinian American writer. Her stories and essays have appeared in publications including The New York Times, Granta, The Believer, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, BuzzFeed, VICE, and NPR. She holds an MA in international affairs from Columbia University and an MFA from the University of Iowa and is a recipient of the Arab Women/Migrants from the Middle East fellowship at Jack Jones Literary Arts. She grew up between the United States and the Middle East and currently lives in Brooklyn.
About the Interviewer
Karla Mendez is a writer and artist based in Florida. She is obsessed with buying books at a faster pace than she can read. An avid journal keeper, her favorite part of the day is watching the sun rise as she writes. She is always happy to discuss books and films - find her on Instagram at @kmmendez
