Sunday Submissions: Tenure-Track Position in Arab Middle Eastern Studies
“The Department seeks candidates whose research focuses on literature, visual media, and/or other cultural texts.”
Poetry
On Taking Beirut’s Bookoholics to 80,000 Readers & Beyond
“I tried to start a book club at the university, but it wasnʹt a priority to students or to the university. I then reached out online to readers residing in Lebanon and with steady baby steps, I was able to announce the first book club meeting on July 18, 2012, in a coffee shop in Hamra Street in Beirut.”
For National Poetry Day: 10 from New or Forthcoming Collections
Each time I begin to write about love
the other woman reaches out
and pushes my fingers from the keyboard
the lonely woman who lost everything
the wild woman
who looks like me
3 Iraqis on Almultaqa Short Story Prize’s 2018 Longlist
“According to the release, the five-person jury, chaired by Kuwaiti critic Suad Alenzi, considered 197 short-story collections from around the world.”
Mohammed Ali Ahmed: ‘Can You Hear the Call?’
“This poem first reached my ears on the baritone waves of Abdel Aziz Daoud’s captivating voice.”
Friday Finds: ‘The Earth Opens and Welcomes You,’ by Abdellatif Laâbi
“The earth opens / and welcomes you / Why these cries, these tears / these prayers. / What have they / lost / What are they looking for / those who disturb/ Your new-found peace?”
Sunday Submissions: EBRD Literature Prize 2019
The first prize, worth €20,000, will be equally divided between the winning author and translator. Two runners-up and their translators will receive a prize of €1,000 each.
Rasha Omran: ‘Now Death For Me Is No Longer Abstract’
“The concept of exile, I think, is usually accompanied by a feeling of alienation. I don’t feel alienated in Egypt. I don’t feel that I am a stranger. But had I been in my country in this age, would I have written about my loneliness? I am not sure. I tend to think no. So, perhaps this collection can be included in the poetry of exile.”
Samar Yazbek’s ‘La Marcheuse’ Makes Prix Femina Longlist
Yazbek’s La Marcheuse follows Rima, a girl from Damascus who cannot stop walking.