<P> Season of Migration to the North (Arabic: موسم الهجرة إلى الشمال ‎ Mawsim al - Hiǧra ilā ash - Shamāl) is a classic post-colonial Sudanese novel by the novelist Tayeb Salih . Originally published in Arabic in 1966, it has since been translated into more than twenty languages . Salih was fluent in both English and Arabic, but chose to pen this novel in Arabic . The English translation was published in 1969 as part of the influential Heinemann African Writers Series . The novel is a counter narrative to Heart of Darkness . It was described by Edward Said as one of the six great novels in Arabic literature . In 2001 it was selected by a panel of Arab writers and critics as the most important Arab novel of the twentieth century . </P> <P> In January 1899, a condominium, or joint - authority, was established to rule over Sudan by Britain and Egypt . Sudan gained independence in 1956, but was then engulfed in two prolonged civil wars for much of the remainder of the 20th century . This novel is set in the 1960s, a significant and tumultuous time in Sudan's history . </P> <P> The unnamed narrator has returned to his native village in the Sudan after seven years in England furthering his education . It is the 1960s, and he is eager to make a contribution to the new postcolonial life of his country . </P> <P> On his arrival home, the Narrator encounters a new villager named Mustafa Sa'eed who exhibits none of the adulation for his achievements that most others do, and he displays an antagonistically aloof nature . Mustafa betrays his past one drunken evening by wistfully reciting poetry in fluent English, leaving the narrator resolute to discover the stranger's identity . The Narrator later asks Mustafa about his past, and Mustafa tells the Narrator much of his story, often saying "I am no Othello, Othello was a lie," as well as "I am a lie ." </P>

Where does season of migration to the north take place