Awards and acclaim have collected around Rawi Hage ever since he published his debut novel in 2006. Although Hage came relatively late to novel writing, his first, De Niro’s Game, won the prestigious IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Other awards followed for his second novel, Cockroach, and his third, Carnival, which was released in the U.S. just last month.
Yesterday evening, the Arab American Museum announced winners of the 2013 Arab American Book Awards. There were four winners and five honorable mentions.
Philip F. Kennedy, the Library of Arabic Literature’s General Editor, has been a key force in putting systems in place and getting the LAL — which focuses on Arabic-English editions of classical and pre-modern Arabic literature — on its feet. He spoke with ArabLit at the 2013 Abu Dhabi International Book Fair about how the project came about, noting a few the challenges the editors and editor-translators have faced.
For the next few months, ArabLit will be running a series of interviews and essays on Iraqi poetry: with poets, critics, translators, and others. August 1: Basim al-Ansar: ‘Poetry Is […]
“In our house we break a fast / with dates from Huun / and glasses of buttermilk. / Then on to bowls of lamb soup / flavored with mint, trays / of stuffed grape leaves, / spiced fava beans drenched / in olive oil and lemon juice. / And that is only the beginning.”
Keep Your Eye on the Wall, ed. Mitch Albert and Olivia Snaije, is a book that knits together photos and prose about the Separation Wall that snakes through Palestine. Photos from the book are currently exhibiting in France, where the book is already out. It’s forthcoming from Saqi Books in September. Meanwhile, Albert and Snaije answered a few questions.
“Superagent” Nicole Aragi shared her insights on selling translations to an American reading public with Guernica magazine.
This summer, an English translation of Mahmoud Saeed’s 1970 novel, Ben Barka Lane, came out from Interlink Books, trans. Kay Heikkinen.
On the 4th of July, the Edinburgh World Writer’s Conference (@edwritersconf) tweeted: “As Cairo is on our minds, it’s a fitting moment to publish our Egyptian #worldwritersconf keynote by @SaharElmougy”.
