> The 2000 romance novel Zabibah and the King was published anonymously by whichauthor?And the answer is: Saddam Hussein. The late President of Iraq wrote four novels and a number of poems. The firsttwo books were Zabibah and the King and The Fortified Castle, and were publishedanonymously.The original cover of Zabibah and the King. (Credit: Eloff777, Wikimedia, CCBY-SA 3.0)Zabibah and the King is a nearly 200-page novel that deals in an allegoricalromance between an Iraqi king and a villager named Zabibah. Though the narrativetakes place in the distant past, it is clear that Hussein intended the characterof the king to represent himself. The novel covers a series of longconversations on politics, free will and a number of other issues, though itlacks a real plot or direction. The novel was well-received in Iraq but a 2011 Guardian article describes the Zabibah-King relationship as "a tortuouslyextended metaphor."Regardless of its reception, Zabibah and the King is a select cut from the eliteliterature genre known as "dictator lit[https://www.theguardian.com/books/series/dictator-lit]." The book is nowcurrently available on Amazon[https://www.amazon.com/Zabiba-King-Author-Saddam-Hussein/dp/1589395859/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Zabibah+and+the+King&qid=1592335689&sr=8-1]. Read if you dare.