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Saturday Summer Re-Runs: Alexandra Chreiteh on Writing About Menstruation in...
In what sort of language can an author write about something as banal and contested as menstruation? Should a character pee in colloquial Arabic or Modern Standard? In the first part of a two-part...
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Saturday Summer Re-runs: On Translating ‘A’ishah al-Ba’uniyyah, Perhaps...
Th. Emil Homerin, editor-translator of the recently-published The Principles of Sufism, has long been interested in the work of ‘A’ishah al-Ba’uniyyah, who is perhaps the most prolific and prominent...
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For ‘Women in Translation’ Month, 8 New or Forthcoming Books by Arab Women
August is Women in Translation Month (#WITMonth). A look at literature in translation shows that women’s books represent only around 30% of titles published in translation in English. Efforts to shift...
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Saturday Summer Re-Runs: Salwa Bakr on ‘Women and Arabic Literature’
In the the 1980s, novelist Salwa Bakr said, “Every day you would open the window and find a female author writing a new book.” This piece initially ran in November 2012 and is part of our lead-up to...
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Best-selling Kuwaiti Author Bothayna al-Essa on the Anti-Consumerist Attitude...
Best-selling Kuwaiti author Bothayna al-Essa was recently part of this year’s Emirates LitFest as well as the AUK Biennial LitFest: In the second installment of a special feature on the journeys of...
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For International Women’s Day: 5 Poets You Should Know in English Translation
For International Women’s Day, ArabLit contributor Norah Alkharashi has put together a list of Arabophone women poets who may be acclaimed in Arabic, but are little-known in English: By Norah...
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Announcing the Debut of ‘Warwick Prize for Women in Translation’
This week, organizers announced the first ever Warwick Prize for Women in Translation — although it was, I think, supposed to get its big reveal today: In any case, the debut Warwick will be awarded...
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Women and Arabic Literature: News from Cairo and Casablanca
“Serious” literature is, in most languages, a male-dominated business. Literary works translated into English have hovered around a 70-30 split: Exotic and kitchsy? This often reflects a bias in the...
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Women, Gulf Citizens Make Up Majority of Emerging Writers Chosen for IPAF’s...
This week, a group of six emerging writers joined two award-winning novelists — Hammour Ziada and Mohammed Hasan Alwan — for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF)’s eighth nadwa, held at...
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‘Women in Translation’ Month, and 5 New or Forthcoming Books by Arab Women
This August marks the third annual Women in Translation month, held with the aim of encouraging readers, reviewers, publishers, booksellers, and librarians – but especially readers – to engage with...
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Renaissance in Four Voices: Four Women Writers Celebrated in Beirut
On the seventh of July, PEN Lebanon will celebrate four women writers: Rasha al-Ameer, Elfriede Jelinek, Leila Baalbaki, and Ingeborg Bachmann: Of these four women writers, one hasn’t had a book...
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‘Here’s to Blowing Savior Literature off the Shelves’
So tweeted Egyptian writer Yasmin El-Rifae, when sharing the list of 10 — which was really 15, because sometimes one can’t help oneself — books by women writers that should be translated from Arabic to...
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Why Iraqi Novelist Ali Bader Shifted Women’s Liberation to the Center of His...
The work of Iraqi novelist underwent a serious shift in the last few years. From a piece in Qantara: Ali Bader could have rested on his laurels. As an author of philosophical fictions, Bader achieved...
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Women Write War: 4 Books
The April issue of Words Without Borders features a section titled “Women Write War,” with fiction, poetry, and essays translated from the Spanish, Italian, Hebrew, Ukranian, Bosnian, French, Russian,...
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Happy Un-International-Women’s Day: 9 Works by Arabophone Women
Yesterday, Elisabeth Jaquette celebrated International Women’s Day by highlighting gender disparities in translation. Today, for Un-International-Women’s Day, nine works by Arabophone women that shift...
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And the Prize for Women in Arabic Translation Goes to… No One?
On International Women’s Day, literary translator Elisabeth Jaquette explores the spaces for women in translation from Arabic into English: By Elisabeth Jaquette Where are the women in English...
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Women in Translation (from Arabic): Does It Matter?
Although commentators have often suggested Arab women’s literature is over-emphasized in the West, Arabic literature tends to experience a gender imbalance that’s similar to the other languages: For...
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Alexandra Chreiteh on Writing About Menstruation in Modern Standard Arabic
In what sort of language can an author write about something as banal and contested as menstruation? Should a character pee in colloquial Arabic or Modern Standard? In the first part of a two-part...
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Egyptian Writer-Translator Ibtihal Salem Dies, 66
Egyptian short-story writer, novelist, and translator Ibtihal Salem died early Saturday at the age of 66: Salem was born in Giza and study psychology at Ain Shams University. After that, she worked in...
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Summer Re-Run: Arab Women Writers Recommend Their Favorite Arab Women Writers
In 2014, ArabLit did a very popular “Year of Reading Arab Women.” A number of readers asked for a follow-up in 2015. In January of this year, nine acclaimed Arab women writers chose favorite books by...
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