Bulaq and Vote
If you’re in the US, and have the vote, please swing by the polls and get your sticker:
While you’re on your way — or as you wait for results, or as you assiduously ignore what’s going on in the US — catch up on any & all Bulaqs you might have missed.
In this episode we talk about recent developments in Cairo, kids’ literature in Arabic, Naguib Mahfouz, and the launch of Marcia’s new project, the literary magazine ArabLit Quarterly.
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This week we talk to an old Cairo friend, acclaimed Egyptian artist Ganzeer, about art, propaganda, publishing and how much damn work it is to put out a graphic novel.
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We talk about looking down on dialect; passing literary theft off as “salvation”; the beginning of awards season; a book that is a fragmented portrait of Jerusalem; and our fellow podcasters in the region.
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19: Back To School
We talk about the relationships between education and literature; about a devastating entry in the prison memoir genre, from Syria; about the legacy of V.S. Naipaul; and about why Kuwait is the worst offender in the region for censoring books.
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In our last episode before a summer hiatus, we discuss a graphic novel about the life and art of the stars of Arab music and cinema; Egyptian writer Radwa Ashour’s memoir of studying at university in the United States in the 1970s; and the Moroccan writer Ahmed Bouanani’s novel The Hospital, out in English (alongside a new poetry collection, The Shutters) after nearly falling into oblivion.
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We talk to humorist Karl Sharro about the origins story of his Twitter alter-ego Karl ReMarks and about finding the ideal online nemesis. Marcia takes issue with a new book listing the “hundred best novels in translation.
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16: Pick Your Team
In which Ursula and Marcia discuss how much innocence American can claim when abroad, and the urge to write expatriate diaries in one’s twenties; they also talk about the new collection Marrakech Noir; and about the never-ending debate over Classical versus Colloquial Arabic.
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15: Alexandria When?
Inspired by a fiery essay by an Egyptian professor, Ursula and MLQ discuss cosmopolitanism, nostalgia, and literary representations of the city of Alexandria. Marcia also talks about three new books – from Iraq, Southern Sudan and Lebanon/London. She loved two of them.
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We discuss Marcia’s recent interviews with professors teaching Arabic literature in translation; an essay by Lebanese novelist Rabih Alameddine’s in which he picks apart “world literature” and foreign writers – such as himself – who act as “tour guides”; and a book that is an ambitious overview of modern art in the Arab world.
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Ursula and Marcia talk about the novel Tales of Yusuf Tadros – about a Coptic Christian and aspiring artist living in the provinces — and the playful, genre-bending Kayfa Ta (“How To”) series. They also discuss sexism in literature and whether we can do without the Nobel Prize for Literature.
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12: All Over The Map
In this episode, we talk about debates surrounding Western military intervention in Syria; about Arab American writer Randa Jarrar and her Twitter rant against the late Barbara Bush; and about whether there is any alternative to the term “Arab world.” Also Ursula has a squeaky chair.
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11: Stillborn in Egypt, Fractured in Palestine
We spend most of this episode talking about two books: the late Arwa Salih’s Stillborn, a memoir of and reckoning with her time as a Leftist student militant in Egypt in the 1970s; and Rabai al-Madhoun’s novel Fractured Destinies — about lives constrained, conflicted and divided in Palestine.
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In which Marcia talks about her difficulties being interviewed; we discuss genre (sci-fi, fantasy, and especially noir) writing in Arabic; and we question whether translation into English “empowers” women writers from the Arab region.
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In which we discuss the validity and necessity of the negative review (or what we like to simply call critical engagement); how rare it is to find negative reviews these days; and the shift that has seen Western reviewers of Arabic literature move from one extreme to another. But is it more condescending to dismiss outright or to offer all-around encouragement?
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8: Escape Acts
Ursula and MLQ discuss a moving new book documenting the suffering and the resourcefulness of Yazidi women taken captive by Daesh, and the efforts to help them escape; and the perversely dull newspaper columns of the great Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz.
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7: Soft Power
We discussed our recent readings. This includes some early foreign reporting on Morocco, which is both vivid and prejudiced; a moving account of the way Moroccan political prisoners clung to their memories and their words and refused to be fully “disappeared” during the country’s decades of repression; and a collection of beautifully translate and unusual folktales, shared by Lebanese women with each other. We also discussed the Cairo Book Fair, whose official theme this year is “Soft Power…How?”
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6: Court Jesters and Black Mirrors
In this episode we discuss Moroccan literature about the country’s “years of lead” and its formidable and ruthless former king Hassan II; and about the relationship between humour, fear and power. We look at literary awards and what they are good for, and why Arablit has decided to create a new award. And we ask: how much contemporary Arabic literature is “dystopian”?
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5: Sacred Cows
In this episode of BULAQ we highlight several new and forthcoming translations from Arabic to English. We also discuss the newly translated Concerto Al Quds by the renowned Syrian poet Adonis, as well as Adonis’ own status as an artist and public intellectual, and his stance on religion and revolution.
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In this episode, we look back at 2017 about talk books published in the past year: notable books, favorite books, books we felt were overlooked, books we don’t quite agree on, and books we can’t wait to read. We also discuss how not to write about “discovering” Arabic and the Arab world.
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3: Palestinian literature: regrets, tough choices and teen adventures
President Trump just recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel – a move that acknowledges only a single Israeli narrative. We discuss Palestinian writers and how they write about their relationships with Israelis; about living with trauma and danger; about coming of age under occupation. We also look at the emerging field of children’s and young adult literature in Arabic.
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In which we discuss the fictional underworlds of Rabee Jaber and other Lebanese novelists; and explore Saudi poetry, from a new translation of a famous pre-Islamic collection to the satirical poems of “a grumpy old man” in the Najd in the 18th century. At this time when women are denouncing male abuses of power the world over, we look at two Moroccan female writers who are critical of their societies and who face the question of how their work is received and represented at home and abroad. Asma Lamrabet proposes a progressive feminist re-reading of the Koran; Leila Slimani is an award-winning novelist who has written a book on “sexual misery” in Morocco.
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In the midst of crackdown on gay men in Egypt, we discuss Mohammed Abdel Nabi’s novel about being gay in Cairo, In The Spider’s Room. Also: a portrait of a love-hate relationship with a Cairo neighborhood, an award for Arabic Young Adult and children’s literature, a Saudi novelist under attack online, and a Palestinian poet whose trial hinges on translation.
November 6, 2018 @ 7:23 am
Dejen de mandarme mensajes!! Enviado desde mi smartphone Samsung Galaxy.