You are forgiven for thinking that you’ve already read this story (as this and this are still fresh in public memory), and the same has happened recently to Syrian and Iraqi authors: The June 28 “Narrating Gaza” event was supposed to be… Read More ›
Palestine 
‘A Lot of Translating is About Not Making A Fuss’
One of ArabLit’s favorite readers and book-club leaders, Elisabeth Jaquette, has just posted the Cairo Book Club’s first-ever podcast, from their discussion of Mourid Barghouti’s “I Was Born There, I Was Born Here,” led by the book’s English-language translator, Humphrey Davies.
Fady Joudah and Ghassan Zaqtan Win 2013 Griffin Poetry Prize
“Like a Straw Bird It Follows Me: and Other Poems,” by Ghassan Zaqtan, trans. Fady Joudah, has won this year’s international Griffin Poetry Prize.
PalFest Wrap: The Iron Man of Literary Festivals
At the usual sort of literary festival, a visiting author appears briefly and does a public reading, Jeremy Harding said on PalFest’s final night in Ramallah. After that, the author either goes back to his hotel room or wanders around the host city.
But the Palestine Festival of Literature is different, Harding said.
Basel Zayed on Translating Poetry into Music: ‘I Believe That Words, They Come Up With the Music’
Oud player Basel Zayed has translated two poems by Mahmoud Darwish, five or six by Najwan Darwish, and “a lot of 3ameya” poetry into music. In a Ramallah cafe on PalFest’s last night, he talked about the process.
PalFest Day 6: What is Cultural Boycott?
On Thursday, the author-participants of PalFest 2013 met with Omar Barghouti, one of the founding committee of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), to ask questions about the campaign.
UPDATE: Ghassan Zaqtan’s Visa Issue Resolved
Presumably Canada will come around on the issue of a visa for Palestinian poet Ghassan Zaqtan, who along with translator Fady Joudah is on the shortlist for the 2013 Griffin Poetry Prize. Hopefully, this will be before the prize ceremony next month
PalFest Day 5: Translation of Translation of
More than 200 people were at PalFest’s biggest event yet on Wednesday night in Nablus: The night began with an excerpt of Omar El-Khairy’s Sour Lips. A play, necessarily, is a collaborative translation by the director, actors, and others. Wednesday night’s rendering was also a translation into… Read More ›
PalFest Day 4: The City and the City
PalFest South finished up its run after a final breakfast. For the writers of PalFest North, Tuesday presented the most intense of psychological shifts.
PalFest Day 3: Steering, Ya3ni
On Monday evening, the PalFest of the South — in Gaza — held their closing-night event at the restored Dar al-Basha house. Meanwhile, the PalFest of the North held its second literary evening in the garden of the British Council in Jerusalem.
PalFest Day 2: Narrative and Conflict
Many of the spaces that the PalFest’s northern group traveled through on Sunday — from Ramallah to Birzeit to Jerusalem — were mute. Some were narrativized only by half-thoughts such as KEEP THE TERMINAL CLEAN and HAVE A SAFE AND PLEASANT STAY signs, which book-end Qalandiya’s cattle-prod checkpoint.
PalFest Beginnings: Experiments in Translation, Laughter in Gaza
The six-city festival opened in Gaza on Friday (after a group drove up from Cairo) and in Ramallah on Saturday night (after a second group crossed the Allenby Bridge from Jordan).
