Saïd the Fisherman is Marmaduke Pickthall's best-known novel and
deservedly so.
Saïd is by profession a fisherman, by nature a scamp. In his early
twenties, he has been married to Hasneh for seven years, is childless
and practises his trade on the Palestine coast near Haifa. He gives up
fishing and sets off for Damascus, abandoning his wife on the way. To
all whom he meets he lies and poses in order to defraud and to escape
disaster. He reaches Damascus in the summer of 1860 and there lives a
hand-to-mouth existence. Saïd the Fisherman is the story of his
escapades amidst the build-up of tension between the Christian community
on the one side and the Muslims and Druze on the other. In Saïd,
Pickthall has created an unforgettable personality.