Is Geography Destiny? A Deleuzoguattarian Reading of The Little Black Fish

Samad Behrangi, who is known as one of the most significant revolutionary writers of modern literature in Iran, wrote The Little Black Fish in 1968. It is a world-famous children’s story that has been translated into many languages. The story is considered to be a political allegory that traces the adventures of a little black fish that seeks liberty. The fish decides to leave his homeland in order to find an alternative geography that will bestow him freedom. However, the act of migration from a tiny pool to a vast sea is not an easy task. The fish faces many hardships, including his family’s resistance and the various difficulties on his way. Samad Behrangi’s story profoundly shows the road to freedom is full of obstacles. In this perspective, it is possible to argue that the fish’s desire to reach the sea is a symbolic endeavor to create a new perception of a place that allows him to decentralize the sharp borders of his constructed identity. The journey provides the fish with an opportunity to interact with external milieus and to reinforce certain aspects of his life that help him to build a multidimensional identity. The fish does not fall into the stable and the assigned categories of individuality, but rather he is a multiple and always-in-process character. Within this framework, the fish’s journey aligns with Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of the “becoming” process. Behrangi shows how the fish breaks away from the normative codes of his society and transforms into a boundless and free individual. Deleuze and Guattari maintain that the multiplicity of becoming is always “dwelling within us” (1980, p.240). Therefore, as we see in the character of the fish, the process of becoming is a continual transformation, and it creates a permanent desire for change.