Shahrazad and the Oppressed Femininity

By Yusuf Qatami and Mahmoud Hammad

A glance at “Shahrazad and the Oppressed Femininity”
In this book, the author addressed specific details that other novels did not address before. It talks about recurring events faced by Arab middle eastern women which in turn had a significant impact on changing their course of life. Shahrazad’s novel is the best companion in which the image of the Arab woman and her life struggles are shown in the form of a collection of stories treated by the protagonist “Shahrazad” from her feminine point of view with the consultations of the antagonist, her husband. Who in turn gives his opinion from a purely misogynistic point of view.
In this psychological novel, Shahrazad tells her repressive husband true stories about several women she met by chance. Her pure feminine nature aroused her curiosity to learn about the hidden secrets behind the calm faces of these characters, where she finds hearts loaded with pain and suffering. Thus, Shahrazad took the initiative to help them, curing their wounds and ensuring a better life for them. Although she was unable to help herself and remained a victim of her tyrannical husband, Shahrazad couldn’t break her chains and remained trapped in the “great palace”, her eternal prison. She devoted herself by sacrificing and accepting to be the scented candle that burns for the happiness of others. Shahrazad and the Oppressed Femininity is a must-read book full of diverse and unique experiences.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 3, 2022
• ISBN: 9781665571852

Yusuf Qatami

Professor Dr. Yusuf Qatami is a graduate of UCLA, Los Angeles University, majoring in Cognitive Psychology. A Psychological consultant, worked at the University of Jordan, Arab and foreign universities for 35 years. He is the author of more than 40 academic books on advanced topics in psychology. He authored two published novels. He practices psychological counselling and training in the topics of personal development and psychotherapy. He is also working on producing an encyclopaedia on topics linking psychological topics with drama and psychotherapy, most of which are directed towards empowering women towards psychological safety. Mahmoud Hammad. Holds a diploma in theatre, BA degree in Languages and Literature, and MA degree in Psychology. He is an author, psychotherapist, and actor. He has some of theatrical and television works in the Middle East and recently began to practice his acting profession and work in the field of emotional health in Canada where he currently resides. He is interested in the rights of oppressed people all over the world, highlighting them through his writings and artistic works, in addition to what he learned based on psychological theories by owning some tools to help any human being to overcome their weakness. Mahmoud is an ambitious person who strives with all his strength to develop himself and his skills to become a person who has a great impact on the world level.

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© 2022 Yusuf Qatami and Mahmoud Hammad. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 09/27/2022

ISBN: 978-1-6655-7186-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-7185-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022917899

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Shahrazad Tempts Herself

Shahrazad Compliments

Shahrazad Talks to Her Virtual Friend

Shahrazad’s Priorities

The Narcissism of Shahrazad

Shahrazad and Aisha

Shahrazad and Ghandoura

Shahrazad and Jasmine

Shahrazad and Diana

Shahrazad and Samia

Shahrazad and Rihanna

Shahrazad and Nadia

Shahrazad and Noor

Shahrazad and Gharam

Shahrazad and Elham

Shahrazad and Susan

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Shahrazad Tempts Herself

Here stands Shahrazad, meditating, bearing many things for the sake of the woman who gave birth to her. Shahrazad maintains silence. Sometimes she is optimistic and sometimes pessimistic. She stands with herself; I am putting on my shoulders this responsibility to bear, the responsibility of the inherited woman’s tragedy since creation.

I wonder and ask myself if I am ready to take on more responsibilities and burdens? I ask myself why should I bear all this trouble, and for what? What do I want from this?

The door of dialogue between Shahrazad and herself has shut. I must bear it all, for am I not like the camel? Like the painting of the man carrying the sacred rock on his shoulders; he only wanted to carry it, and when taking that responsibility, he did not look around.

Are you up to this responsibility?

Have you thought carefully about the psychological harm that will be caused to you, Shahrazad?

Will you continue the long journey of saving the woman till the end?

Do you expect satisfaction from men whose wives have been returned, after they were lost, afraid, depressed, and unconscious?

I consider myself the fate of these four halos and more, I am ready to face their consequences.

But where are you, Shahrazad, in all of this?

I am everything. I say, lead, organize, repeat, and arrange.

I am present in every phrase I understand, speak, and pass on to the beloved woman.

I dedicate myself to be a servant to every woman who takes any breath and sheds any tear from her eyes. I am responsible for every tear shed by a woman and every sigh sighed by a woman suffering.

I am talking to myself exactly as if I am talking to any woman about what is bothering her. I know that women are afraid of many things that they claim to understand. I also know that women worry about many things that they do not know where they came from, who caused them, imposed them, or threw them in their way.

I know that women are agitated for reasons, and even for no reasons, and I understand that. I know that women have mastered the art of eagerness that any other living creature in this world lacks. They are the first and the last in teaching others the lessons of eagerness and passion.

I know that it is the woman who understands the meaning of the day and makes out of each letter uttered in this day, a life that only those who were subject to the day can understand.

I know that women come to terms with separation. That they master the art of separation, that they are patient about separation experiments, and that they master making it an austerity that serves their love and revolves around it.

I know that a woman has charm, but she wishes to die once she feels that she has lost her charm, which often happens as she grows older.

I know that she is the most altruistic creature. She perfectly deludes others that she is full even though she is starving, so that her companion, husband, love, son, or daughter will eat! Who can be more altruistic than a woman?

And if I am to learn to describe the love of a woman since she was created, then she has been wrapped in the cover of beautiful patience, and if you unintentionally catch her while she is patient, you will realize that she has mastered Jacob’s patience for his separation from his beloved Joseph when he kept saying: Beautiful patience and God helps.

I know that she is patient, and that her patience never runs out for any reason, she is always sure that her patience has a special taste; a taste only those who suffer with her know.

Once in a while, she sings (beautiful patience) a song. From the first moment when love begins, you can require her to be patient, and she is able to assure you that she is to be patient. If you are not sure, then you can try it, and you will not find that your endeavor to undergo such a trial had been a risk. On the contrary, you will find that she is more patient than all the people of this universe."

I know that she becomes a volcano when she loves, and that the crater of this volcano won’t calm down until the Day of Judgment, but she controls her volcano whenever she wants and leaves it free to erupt whenever she wants. I know that her volcano is different from the volcanoes of the earth; it is a silent volcano, whose crater can release unexpected things, such as anger, hatred, audacity, severity, and cruelty, and then calm down. She can be silenced by simple things that trust in her value, and every woman has that which fits her value.

When we talk about a woman’s jealousy, it should be mentioned that her jealousy is like a fire that burns everyone around her. When she is jealous, you can feel that she was only created to be jealous and nothing other than that.

I know that she willingly dizzies those who are in front of her if she wants, and this may be one of her limitless tactics. No psychologist can determine or control this method, as she is an encyclopedia of the science of dizziness. Poor is he who stands facing one of the storms that women eject in the air.

I know that a woman makes you dizzy, makes you feel like you are in control of your dizziness, then pulls herself from responsibility, and claims that you are responsible for your own dizziness.

I know that a woman can do the impossible for whomever she wants, as she knows the map of ‘the impossible’ even better than Napoleon Bonaparte himself when he repeated: ‘I do not believe that there is anything impossible.’ The woman does not know that she represents the impossible itself, and she will always beat the impossible in any competition, if she wants to do so.

I know that when a woman wants, it is. And when not, it is not. Therefore, she limits the freedom of all others when she wants, and pulls their freedom when she wants, but when she pulls it, she makes you a slave who swore to obey, and never disobey, her commands, and so she is an army in one and an integrated nation in one.

I know that she easily causes anemia to others, as her look turns you into a yellow ghost of weakness.

I know that she can question other’s memories, and that you can become an Alzheimer’s patient even if you are still young. She has a way of weakening other’s memory if she wants, without feeling that she is destroying the youth of those who stand in front of her.

I know that she can make anyone feel worthless, disappointed, lost, and scattered because she has a hidden storage of experiences. A storage that she may have inherited from the history of the first woman on earth; her hypothetical mother from whose memory were copied all the events of creation in an imaginary tape that she learned without prior intention.

Shahrazad sat with herself, recalculating, and assuring herself that what she said was correct. But she entered a zone of self-doubts and noticed some fears that she once thought she was immune to.

Shahrazad put her hand on her cheek; she went through black thoughts. Aren’t you a woman like all women?

My name is Shahrazad, and that makes me special!

You have wronged yourself, Shahrazad. What forces you to bear and witness all this pain? What forces you to be patient and intelligently listen to every woman? What guarantees your safety after you get out of this swamp that you do not believe in? What makes you think that you are immune to the infection of this psychological consumption that you fall within unintentionally?

"You are right with all your whats (what, what, what, what)! But I would like to assure you that I have an intelligent intuition that provides me with the appropriate solution for every situation or trap I might fall into. It is true that I may have the definitive answer with which to reassure you, but my intuition tells me that, as long as I have a previous successful emotional experience, I will find success in everything I do; because I feel that I have a great mission that only a great woman can handle, a woman who is strong enough to bear all the torments, sufferings, and annoyances that will be inflicted on her as a result of my passing by."

I will succeed, and what I am going through will become stories told by mothers to young children carried in their arms.

Do you feel, Shahrazad, that you have finished memorizing all the lessons of women, and that you have been armed with all the necessary weapons to confront all women’s issues and all their difficulties, harassments, and their own apparent and hidden failures to deal with these issues?

Why do random questions spread around me with no order?

Maybe this issue has spread in outer space and there are hidden creatures who want to prevent me from doing this task, or maybe there is a woman who has used her magic to keep a secret for herself, one that she does not want to tell me about.

My hidden thoughts may be an echo of another’s hidden thoughts copied by the flying spirits that we haven’t seen and that only scholars can see.

Or perhaps the thoughts of my mother, who died after giving birth to me, as she did not have the means to transmit to me all that she knows of wisdom, morals, stories, and commandments, as I fall asleep on her knees, as children and mothers do.

It also may be the thoughts of wandering creatures hovering around me at hidden and unspecified times. I guess they spread thoughts to me and record them in my memory without my awareness, perhaps these thoughts become a force that controls my mental powers and controls my will, awareness, plans, and decisions.

Shahrazad restored the desire to talk about her knowledge of women. New ideas began to flow to her, showing experience and knowledge about intelligent women.

I feel that I am a smart woman who understands the requirements of this age especially because I buried the only man in my life, closed that door, and got enough of fear, panic, mortal anxiety, and constant threats to life. Every night I wake up after the rooster rises and stops me talking to my first and last love.

So, I have to be a smart woman to fit in this time, Shahrazad is very sure of her intelligence.

Shahrazad tests herself again and again, to make sure she is smart enough. Shahrazad considers that the task she is to perform will save women so that every woman’s intelligence lasts in this world.

Shahrazad’s mission is a global, human, and emotional mission that requires patience, vitality, sacrifice, self-denial, or else not to be performed at all.

Shahrazad considers herself the mother of every woman in this world, so she adopted this task after donating herself consciously and persistently. So Shahrazad came with a spirit that leads her to the top.

I know that a woman is a hell, her flame saves neither thing nor creature, and if you are confronted by this hell, know that she will have no mercy. She shows that which she has inherited through generations of existence.

Shahrazad knows that a woman who is described as a torment is an unceasing torment, no matter if she was sitting, standing, or lying, she forgives no one. Her torment is one that persists every day, every hour, and every minute. She represents an everlasting torment, and those who fall into it wish they had not been created.

Shahrazad hesitates to express qualities that she does not like in a woman, but they are in truth found in her existence. It is a bitterness that cannot be sweetened and anyone who approaches a woman tastes bitterness. When she is silent, you cannot know whether she is sweet or bitter, but once you approach her, you will taste the unforgettable bitterness.

In many cases, Shahrazad admits that she does not know women, even though she is a woman who has carried women’s burdens since creation. She also finds an excuse for everything she has gone through; that she bears many things and holds the burden of life in order to keep going and continue to play her role in the life she lives, but surprisingly, this ability to understand disappears suddenly.

What surprises me is the fact that women in different eras have inherited a legacy whose details cannot be fully known or recovered.

The tragedy of Shahrazad is her fear of the unknown; the woman is a vast world that cannot be understood. She is an encyclopedia of knowledge and emotion. Whoever claims that he masters her or understands all her lessons is wrong. Even if you spend your lifetime studying her, you will not reach a complete understanding, as long as there are different measurements, as long as life revolves in its cycle, and as long as there are new expressions, emotions, and feelings, no one can claim that he understands.

Shahrazad fears woman despite her intense love for her. For she is afraid of her and afraid for her, she is very emotional, and quick to express, contradictory and fluctuating in her emotions, she cries and, in a moment, turns to smile and laughter. Here lies the genius of a woman who can create a different atmosphere at any moment. If she wants, she brings you hell, and after moments, she can turn the same hell into a paradise, where you forget what you have just suffered, and this requires a very flexible heart, whoever has that heart lives happily with this intelligent fluctuation.

Despite all that Shahrazad offered, she feels that she is very remiss, in her claim that she understands women. Her encyclopedia is still open. Recording events, feelings, and emotions that are still developing and changing, to a point that makes you feel that women keep changing as long as minutes and hours pass, and as long as there are mothers giving birth and influential men causing all the changes that are imposed on them.

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Shahrazad Compliments

On the following pages, Shahrazad wears white glasses and positively looks at the nature of the woman she has loved all her life, to whom she has dedicated herself, to both serve and save from death.

I know that a woman has an intuition that can never be wrong, and this could be due to her extreme patience and deep thinking about the phenomenon to which she dedicates her deep understanding, and so when she speculates in a case related to men she is always right. Shahrazad learned from her long experience with her husband, whom she loved violently, that no woman could love her husband as she loved hers, she always told him about what preoccupied him, and was completely correct in her prediction, which made her husband believe that Shahrazad is a different woman, and no other woman is like her.

Shahrazad’s intuition is attributed to the fact that she was devoted to her husband and did not know anyone else. From him she learned a man’s spirit, strength, thinking, love, conscience, ambition, manliness, self-centeredness, self-love, narcissism, and chivalry. She learned all of that through experience and suffering. She did not wait for him to speak. She was good at reading his eyes when shining, trembling, and when closing; she represented his controlled and uncontrolled emotions. Shahrazad had faith in her beloved man, in whom she saw all the love stories told and not told by history, and she saw in him the legend of loyalty. He always met her good thoughts. She saw him with love, and got angry with him with love, so she saw in him the strength that responded to her intuition.

Madam, please know that intuition is innate in a woman, as she is the one who breastfed the man and raised him after she gave birth to him. She carries it in her genes because of her experience and success in testing the man to become an expert in honest intuitions. Whenever she succeeds in her intuition, she feels extremely happy, Shahrazad said.

Shahrazad knows that every woman has intuition, but she needs to shake off the dust of neglect and forgetfulness. Intuition is a tool that she was born with, so she only has to pay attention to this feature that is not given to man. Therefore, Shahrazad does not hesitate to call women the mothers of intuition, a blessing known only to those who have practiced it among thinking women.

Shahrazad reflects on her superior ability to use her mind to please her husband. She considers this a privilege that works positively to provide her feelings of happiness, so she sees that intuition is added to a woman’s intelligence, and this is a recognition that the woman’s cunning is great, as cunning could be defined by intuition related to intelligence.

I know that intuition is a skill that develops from the instant a woman opens her wise eyes. A wisdom that she inherited from her women ancestors who have been the cause of developing the universe since the beginning of creation.

I know that an expert woman who has succeeded in developing her intuition in the presence of her wise husband can transmit this ability to the people she deals with, especially those she loves and appreciates, or those whose future and happiness she worries about.

Shahrazad knows that intuition is not a mental prescription that she gives to women in one session; it rather needs an ordeal to go through, to ask for help and insist on asking, until Shahrazad presents to her certain steps that guarantee success in this regard. However, Shahrazad must be convinced that the woman who sits in front of her is able to be patient, suffering, and understanding repeatedly, and that she has the ability to foresee her thoughts over and over again.

Shahrazad meditates a lot every time a woman makes a decision as she adopts the hypothesis in caution lies safety. She bids them think, meditate, take your time, sit down and talk to your dear self, and express your most hidden or scary thoughts.

Shahrazad is in a phase of learning more about women, due to her fear for women and her keenness to achieve success in everything she does after going through the experience necessary to mature, to make the right decisions, and above all to reach intuition.

I know that the woman forms a support for the man in all the situations, but being a support requires her to be sane, contemplative, and tolerant. The ‘supporting’ role that women enjoy has become an eternal role, as she is his crutch that appears when needed, even when he is in a state of strength, inflicting the most severe degree of abuse on her, she supports him at any moment when his need for that appears.

The woman was created to be his bond in his various lifetimes, and to be his support without reminding him of what has passed or blaming him for any abuse she faced in her difficult times with him. At the appropriate moment, the woman appears with the bond and support for her husband because she feels that she is an extension of the man’s roots, and that she is the innocent branch that cannot sneak into misunderstandings or abusive situations.

Shahrazad sees the man as a support, although he always threatens her with death. On the contrary, she sees that her husband by death means a happy life, so she proceeds happily throughout her life. Every night, she gets an extra day to add to her age, and she links all the moments of anxiety in her life to her expectation of excellence, success, and happiness regardless of the deathly moments she faces with her husband.

He was threatening me with death, and I was happy with that threat. He was pushing me to think of a new story that attracts his ears, as he had promised me from the first day of our marriage that when the cock crows and dawn appears on the horizon, the end of Shahrazad would be near. Since that promise, her husband’s vigilance had not reached that moment before his death.

I know that a woman is an endless well of love.

Shahrazad believes that a woman’s love for her husband is a unique love with a special taste, and that when Shahrazad loves, she truly loves as she is provided with a unique and rare feminine legacy.

Shahrazad’s love covered all the land around her. For her, love had many and multiple meanings. She is emotional and she is loving. She covers her passion and love with rational thinking, she is emotional and rational at the same time, and she stood behind all the love that she experienced for her husband. She defines her love as all the time she spent thinking of her beloved.

Shahrazad assumed that her love includes all her surrounding thoughts about her lover, and all the feelings she gets when her lover passed through her memory. The surrounding thoughts are the memories of the lover’s characteristics that caused her