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Elmaz Abinader, a poet and teacher of creative writing, offers a vivid account of uprooted and resettled lives of her Lebanese-American family in her lyrical memoir, Children of the Roojme-A Family¡¦s Journey from Lebanon. Spanning four generations and two continents, Children of the Roojme is the story of a family from the mountains of Lebanon and their emigration to western Pennsylvania. More than that, it bears intimate witness to the hardships of World War I, the disintegrating Ottoman Empire, abandonment of centuries-old villages, and the New World conflict between cultural tradition and assimilation. In her remembering, Abinader illustrates fro her readers the classic pattern of Lebanese-Christian immigration at the turn of the century. Prompted by the crash of the silk industry and political oppression, but mostly by the promise of enterprise, men left their mountain villages for America. They peddled their ¡§kashshi¡¨¡Xbundles of notions and other small merchandise, from farm to farm until they could set up their passage money to their families in the old country. Abinader traces the history of her parents and their emigration from the Lebanese town of Abdelli. We enter the world of her maternal and paternal grandparents. In this fascinating family biography, Abinader interweaves scraps from the sojourns of her father and uncles in Brazil's jungles and their return to Abdelli, where the young and handsome Jean Abinader falls in love with his bint al-aam (his father's brother's daughter), Camille. The death of Camille's father thrusts Jean (now Camille's fianc?) as protector and provider of his uncle's widow and his daughter. Children of the Roojme tells a tale of family drama, betrayal, anguish, illness, and death worthy of a good novel.
Approximate Word count = 1073
Approximate Pages = 4.3
(250 words per page double spaced)
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