Zvezdani narativ i kartografija u romanu "Karta soli i zvezda" Zejn Džuhadar

Abstract

The novel The Map of Salt and Stars by Zeyn Joukhadar intertwines the stories of two heroines in parallel – Nour, who is fleeing war-torn Syria in the 21st century, and Rawiya, a 12th-century girl traveling with the renowned cartographer Al-Idrisi. These two narratives depict a dual theme of movement: Nour’s escape and Rawiya’s exploration, both guided by star maps that symbolize constancy despite temporal and spatial differences. This paper explores the symbolism of the stars and their connection to the development of Islamic cartography and astronomy, with a special focus on the significance of Al-Idrisi’s holistic approach, which combines geographic data and the observation of stars. The paper also raises the question of why significant achievements of Islamic science, such as the works of Al-Idrisi, have remained largely unknown in the West