Prison memoir an eloquent treatise on freedom during oppression

Out of government oppression, there will always be a rising of voices. For Jalal Barzanji, his voice was always his writing and that’s exactly why Saddam Hussein couldn’t tolerate him.

The journalist and magazine editor from Iraqi Kurdistan was enjoying a peaceful gathering with his family in March of 1986 when a group of secret policemen armed with AK-47s stormed into his house and beat him before they cuffed and blindfolded everyone and carted them off to an unknown prison.

Barzanji was imprisoned for three years, the subject of brutal beatings and gross mistreatment. He witnessed the executions of children. He was helpless as his own family suffered at the hands of the state-sanctioned bullies.

He was lucky to be set free. He was lucky to escape to Turkey and then immigrate to Canada. He was lucky to become the first PEN Canada Writer in Exile four years ago. In Edmonton, he has found a place where the summer heat and the winter cold are more tolerable (he says Iraqi winter temperatures can reach -50 C), but more importantly, he has also found a sanctuary where he can write and tell the world what it means to be free and what it was like to live under tyranny.

He penned his memoirs during his tenure as the writer in exile. Now, The Man in Blue Pyjamas has finally been published. It is a troubling but enlightening read, but the mere fact that it has reached the printed page should be a celebration in itself.

In the foreword, PEN International president John Ralston Saul calls the book a generous creative act, a response to what he calls “the eternally strange question: why do they – people of power – imprison writers, beat them up, kill them? Why do they so fear the word?”

Barzanji became an enemy of the state because he had the honour and the bravery to write the truth and spread the word. Instead of being celebrated in his homeland for his keen observations about politics and humanity, or even for his ability to turn a phrase, he had to pack up his life and run away in order to keep telling the truth. Instead of submitting himself to Hussein and becoming a docile civilian just to live in his homeland, he fought to be free.

Barzanji’s memoir is entrancing in its portrayal of his fight for this freedom. You could compare it to a Kurdish man’s version of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, and that would be an apt comparison. Barzanji clearly loved – and still loves – his home country. He could have been its greatest ambassador if it weren’t for the way it was twisted and controlled by men with military influence. Even though he is still in Edmonton, it is clear who is the victor in the war of words.

Saddam Hussein has been gone for five years now and Barzanji is still writing.