Men in the Sun (Arabic: رجال في الشمس, romanized: Rijāl fī al-Shams) is a novel by Palestinian writer and political activist Ghassan Kanafani (1936–72), originally published in 1962.
Three Palestinian men of different generations seeking work arrange with a clerk in Basra to be smuggled to Kuwait by a driver.
At several checkpoints the men hide in a large empty water tank in the stifling mid-day heat as the driver arranges paperwork to get through.
Abu Khaizuran seems to enjoy relative power and ease of mobility because of his boss' repute and access to the lorry but he is impotent from a surgical castration he endured ten years prior.
Crossing the border into Kuwait, the three men must hide in the insufferable tank while Abu Khaizuran gets his papers signed but he is delayed by the bureaucrats teasing him for supposedly being serviced by a prostitute.
In response to Abu Baqir's demands to hear the story of his encounter with a prostitute, he deflects "if Hajj told you already, why do you want me to tell it again",[4] implicitly confirming the tale.
The Men's journey through Basra to Kuwait both captures the historical reality of Palestinian migration during the oil boom and symbolizes the precarity of displacement.
"No longer "masters" of their own environments, identities or destinies, the men find themselves suspended in a 'no-man's land' strongly reminiscent of Palestine itself".
[8] Radio artist Joe Frank mentions Men in the Sun in his show 'Another country, part 1', the version in which they die in silence.