“From above, it isn’t possible to see inside the houses, to recognize the lives of the inhabitants, their struggles over the little things and the big things, their movements getting slower and slower all the time. From above, the burnt fields and bewildered animals look more like an abstraction.”
“Sarah’s commitment to translation of poets from southern nations began when she was sent by the British Council in 1996 to Palestine. Through engagement with poets around the world, she developed the determination to fight the notion of ‘otherness’. Sarah chaired the workshops in the same inclusive spirit, and taught me much, and not only about translation.”
Our latest publication, Al-Samidoun (الصامدون) had a ratio of 14 stories by men to 9 by women, while the previous publication – Al-Muntasiroun (المنتصرون) had a radio of 16:8, an improvement. The tide is turning!
“Absent, however, were the stories and experiences of women prisoners of conscience.”
“In a course with limited time to discuss reader perspectives and biases, I prefer to focus on the act of translation.”
The Arab Fund for Arts and Culture has put out an open call for Arabic-speaking applicants for a “Writing Catastrophe” workshop in Berlin with critical-darling Egyptian writer Haytham el-Wardany.
The journal “Two Lines” is looking for the “future of translation.”
“My family put so much pressure on me that I really had to fight and then fight again to go to university. It was unheard of for a girl to leave the village.”
“Long ago, in a former age and a bygone time, there was a king who wished to test the loyalty of his people.”
