On Banipal’s ‘100 Best Arabic Novels’
2018-11-19
“Usefully, the Banipal list is not just a list, but also includes brief introductions to both the works and their authors, as well as some contextualization.”Continue Reading
Egypt’s Sixties Generation Novelists on the Nation and Revolution
2011-02-06
In his essay yesterday about “State Culture, State Anarchy,” Elliott Colla very briefly touched on author Sonallah Ibrahim’s 2003 put-down of the Egyptian state cultural apparatus.Continue Reading
Shorouk-Penguin Partnership Inked: Project Seeks to Improve Translations in Arabic, English
2010-11-25
Last night at Cairo’s Manial Palace, Penguin International President Andrew Phillips and Dar El Shorouk Chair Ibrahim El Moallem formally signed themselves into a partnership that was more than a year in the making: a joint Shorouk-Penguin project that will bring out both Penguin classics and local titles in Arabic.Continue Reading
Gamal al-Ghitani to Arabic Booker Nomination: No, Thank You
2010-07-27
August Egyptian author Gamal al-Ghitani (Zayni Barakat, The Zafarani Files) announced last week that he’s rejected a nomination for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, or the “Arabic Booker.” Continue Reading
/Re:Viewing Egypt/ and More on Photography, Literature and Egypt
2010-07-22
Re:Viewing Egypt, a book of photographs by Xavier Roy (pictured, with a copy) and text by Gamal al-Ghitani (Zayni Barakat, Zafarani Files), is now available in the U.K. from Haus Press.Continue Reading
Notes: Portal for Arabic iBooks Coming Soon, ‘Jordan Festival’ Eschews Lit, Abu Dhabi Fair Cuts Back Invites
2010-06-30
In the last few days, a number of stories have seemed worth mentioning—but they’re stories about which I don’t have enough knowledge to comment. So I thought I’d do as others do, and make a list of links.Continue Reading
Gamal al-Ghitani on the 1,001 Nights and the Egyptian Cultural Scene
2010-06-14
Gamal al-Ghitani is interviewed in this week’s Qantara, mostly on the topic of the latest legal wrangling over 1,001 Nights. With all due respect to a greater literary mind, I must disagree with al-Ghitani’s statement that there is no government censorship of media (newspapers can, for instance, criticize Hosni now?).Continue Reading
Taha Hussein on the Debate over Banning 1,001 Nights
2010-04-28
All right, the dean of Arabic literature died in 1973, so I couldn’t have asked his opinion on the matter. And no, Taha Hussein did not appear to me in a dream, a vision, or a puff of smoke in order to weigh in on the proposed ban of thisContinue Reading
