Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits Literary Elements

Fiction

Morocco and Spain in the early 21st century

The story is told from the third-person point of view by an omniscient narrator.

Tone: optimistic, hopeful, introspective, impatient, anxious

Mood: determined, hopeful, tense, resigned

Murad, Faten, Aziz, and Halima are the protagonists of the story.

Will the four characters be able to make the crossing safely, stay in Spain, and make a life for themselves?

The climax is the capsizing of the Zodiac, which throws the characters into the sea to fend for themselves. This determines who succeeds in making it to Spain and who is deported.

1. When the prayer beads that hung on his rearview window break, Larbi finds himself worrying that this could be an omen; soon after he starts having problems with his daughter.
2. This is also an omen for Faten, whose religiosity is so galling to Larbi that he has her expelled from the university.

1. "Aziz found that he had to alter the details of his daydreams" (147) is an understatement for how far off Aziz is from achieving the success and stability he'd dreamt of.

1. Scarface, the gangster movie with Al Pacino
2. The Moorish invasion of Spain in 711
3. "Fakarouni": a famous song by Oum Kalsoum
4. Paul Bowles (see Other)
5. The Beats: American poets and writers in the 1950s in San Francisco
6. Williams Burroughs: a Beat writer
7. "Heart of Darkness": novel by Joseph Conrad about traveling the Congo River

There is powerful imagery of the dangerous sea crossing, which emphasizes how much the immigrants are willing to endure to have new opportunities.

1. "What if he lost her to this... this blindness that she thought was sight?" (35)

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1. "Finally the motor wheezes painfully and the boat starts moving" (8)
2. "a hope that he knew would eat away at her determination to let him go..." (81)
3. "gold arabesque letters danced on a sea of deep red" (130)