A HYMN To A Tortured heart who never knew love
A novel translation website dedicated to preserving the legacy of Raja Alish, and since there's interest and moderate enjoyment for it. Doing this for fun, but will try to keep updates more or less regular.
Update (13/12/2018) : Book 1 Introduction is complete! Check it out here. Please donate if you want to see more.
This is one of the perks of the extra attractiveness... to be believed by all people as you boldly lie on them, but the scorned ugly person by everyone won't ever be believed even if he said the truth... He is accused by everyone of being a liar... an eternal suspect because he's the odd one out, the freak, the eyesore.
For other quotes, click here.
The Author
Raja Alich (رجاء عليش) is an obscure Egyptian novelist who cut short his career -and his life- in 1979 with a self-inflicted gunshot. Despite wealth and wits, he suffered deeply from society's rejection due to his poor looks. He poured his feelings of dark despair into two novels, and an unpublished suicide note he sent to the procuror general but got held up due to postal delays as no one cared about it, just like they did not care about him or his books.
Raja Alish isn't his real name. It is a reductive pseudonym the author took for himself for reasons unknown, a dark inside joke forever lost to time. Raja sounds like "Hope", and Alish evokes the idea of unkempt hair just like that of a sheep, maybe a vaguely affectionate playful insult he wore on his sleeve proudly? Who knows.
For the record, these paintings are artistic visions of how Raja looked like and not the real deal.
Disclaimer: Those books are not a recommended read for those suffering from depression. The translator does not condone the ideas, beliefs and statements of the author, as much of it was borne out of despair and a negative reinforcement cycle that you can break away from.
Please remember that you are not alone, and it's not impossible for you as long as you have free will and action to find a place and a significant other where you belong. So don't give up!
《I lived all of these long years yearning for taking revenge from the members of this society that successfully made me forsake (apostasy) everything.》
- Only known quote from the manifesto
《My heart is a dehydrated lemon sucked dry by hungry humans, and even hungrier days. If you want my company in this flight, then wear feathers like mine, take with you for this journey some of my food laced with suffering, let the blazing fires scorch your skin, and ascend with me skywards to the void of space for it is our path... our domain.》
Raja Alish, All of Them Are My Enemies
His Books
His only two books are very powerful in how much negativity and despair they have, and are often used in arabian social media as very potent demotivational posters. The publisher refused to print the books, so Raja had to front out the costs on his own. They bombed commercially, something that caused much grief to the author. It's not an exageration to say he put his all into them.
Unfortunate in life and after death, he is a very obscure tortured soul who lacks recognition for his legacy. This blog aims to change that.
- Don't Be Born Ugly
- All of Them are My Enemies
- Unpublished manifesto he sent to authorities before his suicide. Reached them after massive delays due to the postal services not giving a shit about it and arrived long after the police moved on from investigating the suicide. Some scant quotes were published in newspapers.