New on BULAQ: Writing from Amman
New on Bulaq: Writing from Amman
A City of Many Voices That Doesn’t Always Speak Its Own Name
This new episode of the BULAQ podcast explores Jordanian literature and writing about the city of Amman with Ibtihal Rida Mahmood, editor and translator of the anthology Snow in Amman: An Anthology of Short Stories from Jordan. We talk about the iconic feminist and master of the short-story form Basma Nsour, and how Ibtihal came across her work as a pre-teen; the late, gifted, and generous poet Amjad Nasser, whose work still needs further translation; and the great Abdulrahman Munif’s Story of a City, which describes his childhood in the Jordanian capital of Amman during the 1940s.
SHOW NOTES
Abdulrahman Munif’s Story of a City was translated by Samira Kawar and published by Quartet books in 1997.
There is no book-length collection of Basma El-Nsour’s work in translation, but there are many stories available online: at ArabLit, The Common, and elsewhere.
Amjad Nasser’s incredible poetry collection Petra was translated by Fady Joudah. His Land of No Rain was translated by Jonathan Wright.
The twentieth century Jordanian classics that made the list of the “105 Best Novels of the 20th Century,” as voted by the Arab writers union, were: Sultanah, by Jordanian author Ghalib Halasa, Confessions of a Silencer, by Jordanian writer Mu’nis al-Razzaz, and Essential Pillars, by the Jordanian author Elias Farkouh.
You can also check out special issues on Jordanian literature and Amman in Words without Borders and The Common.
Although many Jordanian books elide place, one novel that shows the landscape of contemporary Jordan is Ma’an Abu Taleb’s All the Battles, which was translated by Robin Moger. We also mention two other books whose authors grew up in Amman: Maya Abu Al-Hayyat’s Nobody Knows Their Blood Type and Tarek Baconi’s Fire in Every Direction.