Publishers Weekly today revealed their top 101 Best Books of 2013, which span the adult genres, “nonfiction; fiction; poetry; religion; mysteries and thrillers; cookbooks and lifestyle; health; parenting; crafts and hobbies; comics and graphic novels; science fiction, fantasy and horror; and romance and erotica.” From this list, PW also selects an unranked “top ten”; among these is Syrian novelist and screenwriter Nihad Sirees’s The Silence and the Roar, beautifully trans. Max Weiss:
In PW‘s citation, they note that, “With incisive wit, Sirees marks the celebration that affects freedom, romance, and the right to simply walk down the street unmolested.”
Sirees’s was the only book translated from the Arabic that made the list, and — it seems from a cursory look — one of very view translations.
Also this year, Sirees won Germany’s Coberg Rückert Prize, an award given by the German city of Coburg, and a PEN award for Writing in Translation. Sirees is the author of seven novels, a number of plays, and acclaimed television dramas. He was forced to leave Syria in January 2012.
On ArabLit:
‘The Silence and the Roar’: On Life as a Silenced Writer – Interview with Sarah Irving
Two Views of ‘Syria Speaks’: A Lens on Syria Through the Arts – By Sarah Irving and Nadia Ghanem
Author Nihad Sirees: ‘We Are Fighting the Formal History of a Regime’– By Nadia Ghanem
Syrian Novelist Nihad Sirees: ‘Creative Writing is Stalled Today’ – From Jadaliyya
‘When They Start to Think Only God is With Them, This is Bad’ – From interviews on CNN and BBC
Nihad Sirees on Writers in Syria: ‘What Should We Talk About?’ – By M. Lynx Qualey, from Qantara
Novelist Nihad Sirees on Aleppo Then, Aleppo Now, Aleppo Imagined – From PEN Atlas
On PW:
The review of The Silence and the Roar
An interview with Sirees – “Politics and Prose”
Sirees in English:
A translation of Sirees’s حالة شـغف (here called A Case of Passion, here A State of Passion) both times by Khaled al-Jbaili.
Daddy Dearest: Inside the Mind of Bashar al-Assad – on Daily Beast
Sirees’s twitter feed (@nihadsirees), often in English.
The Silence and the Roar:
The first three chapters of ”الصمت والصخب” on Sirees’s website.
Brilliant. But, tut tut – you haven’t mentioned translator Max Weiss who is surely to be congratulated on getting a translated work on to such a prestigious list – a rare feat.
Oh, shit. I did email Max. Does that count?