Lit & Found: Muhammad al-Maghut, tr. Elliott Colla
If only countries could be / exchanged for one another /
The way dancers are in a cabaret.
Lit & Found
Friday Finds: ‘A Contemporary Novel’ by Maya Abu al-Hayat & Five More
“The female protagonist visits him in the mornings, / taps shyly on the window, sweeps the street with a glance. / (Did anyone see her?).”
Lit & Found: An Excerpt from Diwan Books Co-founder Nadia Wassef’s ‘Shelf Life’
“To the uninitiated pedestrian, Diwan was just one of several shops behind the Baehler mansions’ ornate exterior.”
Lit & Found: Asmaa Azaizeh’s ‘Reflection’
“Yesterday, I handed all my poems to my publisher. / I feel like I handed him my head / and the words I speak from now on
/ will come out of his mouth. / What a disaster!”
Lit & Found: An Excerpt of Ihsan Abdel Kouddous’s ‘I Do Not Sleep’
“You don’t know me, even if I did turn your head both times you saw me. Once on Sidi Bishr beach in Alexandria and another time at the Semiramis Hotel in Cairo. Each time, I didn’t pay much attention to you, as I’d gotten used to turning men’s heads.”
Lit & Found: The Documentary ‘Mujeres Árabes Lápiz en Mano’
This short 29-minute documentary takes the viewer into the lives, studios, and work of four leading Arab comix artists and graphic novelists: Tunisian artist-author Nadia Khiari, Lebanese artist-author Lena Merhej, Moroccan artist-author Zainab Fasiki, and Egyptian artist-author Deena Mohamed.
Lit & Found: An Excerpt of Basma Abdel Aziz’s ‘Here Is a Body’
“They came at four o’clock in the morning and I was too sleepy to get out of the way in time.”
Lit & Found: Hoda Barakat’s ‘The Return of the Non-Prodigal Sons’
“We are not a community, we who stayed abroad.”
Lit & Found: Histories and Archives of Arabic Publishing
All recordings from the recent series “Histories and Archives of Arabic Publishing” are now available online.