News

PEN World Voices has announced its 2015 schedule, and the theme is “On Africa.”

For those looking for just the right place to take a beloved on February 14, clearly there can be nowhere else but Beit El-Sehimi, where Orhan Pamuk, Ibrahim Abdelmeguid, and Sherine Abulnaga will kick off the first-ever Cairo Lit Festival.

This year’s International Prize for Arabic Fiction again passes over books by established authors and chooses an — on the whole — list of young and emerging novelists.

The International Prize for Arabic Fiction shortlist is set to be announced today in Casablanca as the city’s 21st annual international book fair opens.

” An extra gate was opened to the public on Feb. 7 to accommodate the high level of interest in this year’s fair, with entry lines at the main gate on prior days long enough that, on some occasions, it could take visitors up to thirty minutes or even an hour to purchase a ticket and get past security.”

It’s an impossible question, usually answered by shrugs, percentages or a suggestion that such a question shouldn’t be asked. After all, in the end, a literary prize is about books, not their authors.

Authors remember Algerian novelist, poet, activist, and filmmaker Assia Djebar, who has died at 78.

The International Prize for Arabic Fiction shortlist will be announced at 10:50 a.m. GMT on Friday, February 13 (apparently, no triskaidekaphobes on staff). In anticipation, we look at Ashraf al-Khamaisi’s longlisted Sharp Turn: […]

“Not only the greatest Arab traveller of all time, but perhaps the greatest of all time.”