Book Review: Season of Migration to the North by Tayeb Salih

Summary

Season of Migration to the North features Mustafa Sa’eed as the main character and an unnamed narrator. The novel is set in Khartoum, Northern Sudan, where Mustafa was born and raised without a father. With his mother’s permission, he moves to Cairo for his studies and later to London, where his relentless pursuit of desire eventually lands him in prison. The lingering question is whether Mustafa rises above his troubled past to live a life worthy of his remarkable education.

Analysis

When offering an analysis of Season of Migration to the North, I cannot be certain that my words do it justice. This is a deeply layered novel, richer than anything I had previously encountered. I suspect that if I revisit it in a few years, I will find new meanings and offer a different interpretation. For now, I feel compelled to share my reflections. Consider this just a scratch on the surface.

The novel opens with the unnamed narrator returning to his village after seven years of studying poetry in Europe. He soon realizes his education was impractical, since his fellow villagers were farmers who would have benefited more from training in agriculture, engineering, or medicine. Among the welcoming crowd, the narrator notices a man who seems unfamiliar yet striking. This man turns out to be Mustafa Sa’eed, who had settled in the village a few years earlier. Although the villagers knew little about him, they considered him a good man, and he in turn regarded them as good people. He married one of them and had two sons.

The narrator is shocked when Mustafa speaks fluent, refined English, the kind that only great institutions teach. Intrigued, the narrator confronts him, and later that evening Mustafa begins to tell his story—or at least the parts he chooses to reveal. From this point onward, Mustafa becomes an inescapable presence in the narrator’s life.

Mustafa was born in Khartoum. From a young age, he knew he was different. He felt no emotions, whether joy or pain, and remained unmoved even by his teacher’s praise. A classmate once fell in love with him, only to quickly hate him. His sharp intellect propelled him far beyond his village, earning him a scholarship to study in Cairo at just twelve years old. His farewell with his mother was stark and emotionless:

“Had your father lived,” she said to me, “he would not have chosen differently for you. Do as you wish, depart or stay, it’s up to you. It’s your life and you’re free to do with it as you will. In this purse is some money which will come in useful.”
That was our farewell: no tears, no kisses, no fuss. Two human beings had walked along a part of the road together, then each had gone his way.

In Cairo, Mustafa was cared for by Mr. and Mrs. Robinson, yet he felt nothing. Later, in London, he realized that the English he had so diligently studied was unlike the living voices around him. There, he engaged with many women, but everything changed when he met Jean Morris.

At the heart of the novel lies the theme of colonial education and its corrupting influence. In London, Mustafa used his intelligence and charm to seduce women, many of whom later died or took their own lives. He lured them into a carefully constructed bedroom:

“My bedroom was a graveyard that looked on to a garden… The room was heavy with the smell of burning sandalwood and incense… My bedroom was like an operating theatre in a hospital.”

This was his battlefield. He preyed on women deliberately, viewing each conquest as an act of resistance against colonialism and Western domination. He himself remained untouched emotionally, his heart as cold as stone. Perhaps this was the only form of power he felt he possessed.

When Jean Morris rejected him, Mustafa was devastated. He swore that she would pay, as if losing her meant losing a combat of civilizations. His encounters with women became symbols of historical battles. With Isabella, for instance, he likens himself to Arab soldiers first entering Spain, a southern thirst colliding with northern history.

The unnamed narrator, meanwhile, reflects on his own time in London and compares it to life in Sudan. He concludes that neither place is inherently better:

“Over there is like here, neither better nor worse. But I am from here, just as the date palm standing in the courtyard of our house has grown in our house and not in anyone else’s… Once again we shall be as we were, ordinary people, and if we are lies we shall be lies of our own making.”

This passage resonates as a powerful critique of colonialism.

One lingering question remains: why does Mustafa see his life as a lie? Perhaps each reader must find their own answer.

I was struck by Salih’s vivid portrayal of village life in Sudan, particularly the central role of the Nile. The villagers’ lives are closely intertwined, and traditions dictate social expectations, often tragically. For example, the elderly Wad Rayyes insists on marrying Hosna against her will, with devastating results.

Salih’s style is marked by similes, flashbacks, and layered narration, though the lack of a clear narrator sometimes makes the story difficult to follow. At times, I found myself flipping back to confirm who was speaking. Mustafa himself is portrayed as selfish and cold, yet also brilliant. His mother’s emotional distance during his childhood may partly explain his inability to connect with others. Salih describes a formative moment:

“At noon, when I returned to my mother, she asked me where I’d been and I told her. For a moment she glanced at me curiously as though she wanted to hug me, for I saw that her face had momentarily lit up. But she said nothing. This was a turning-point in my life.”

This scene underlines the crucial role of maternal care in shaping a child emotionally, physically, and psychologically.

Conclusion

This is a profoundly rich novel, one of the few I have encountered set in Sudan. I recommend Season of Migration to the North to anyone interested in African literature in the context of colonialism and its aftermath.

Trigger warning: The book contains a violent sexual scene involving characters other than Mustafa and the narrator.