Just as a city's inhabitants differ from outsiders through their knowledge of its streets as well as its stories, so, here, the author distinguishes between the real city of Basra and Basrayatha, the imagined city he has created through stories, experiences, and folklore.

Evoking the literary modernism of authors like Calvino and Borges, and tinged with nostalgia for a city now disappeared, "Basrayatha" is a masterful tribute to the power of memory and imagination.