According to translator Allison Anderson, “over the last two years, an average of 26% of the books of fiction or poetry published in the United States were by women.” However, the percentage of women’s (translated) books on prize lists is significantly lower.
This is the International Women’s Day issue. So, I know, it should be 8s, since this is the 8th. Maybe next year: SIX POEMS & PROSE EXCERPTS By ARAB WOMEN WRITERS: Iman Mersal’s “Oranges,” trans. Khaled Mattawa Maram al-Massri’s “Women… Read More ›
Novelist Salwa Bakr spoke to CASA students this past week about women and Arabic literature, beginning with the 1980s, when, “Every day you would open the window and find a female author writing a new book”.
Inanna Publications has sent out a call for its new anthology, scheduled for publication in the fall of this year. The book, called Min Timeh: Arab Feminist Reflections on Identity, Resistance, and Space, is being edited by Ghadeer Malek and… Read More ›
Tell me, O tell me! by the planets that are above Who is the heavenly herald who is the dove That thrilled to our midst from yon horizon and sea To cry live Egypt live independent and free -Jawdat R…. Read More ›
During recent visits to Jordan and Syria, Boston librarian Diane D’Almeida (pictured) videotaped short interviews with a dozen different Arab authors. She also has since interviewed a dozen Boston-based authors, asking similar basic questions: Why do they write? For whom (if… Read More ›
ArabLit contributor Mona Elnamoury reflects on what Kate Chopin would’ve gained from the International Prize for Arabic Fiction-sponsored “nadwas,” or writers’ retreats, and what a modern Arab ”Kate Chopin” needs to write and publish. I have always thought of her amidst… Read More ›
In celebration of yesterday’s women’s march (and its male supporters, who I’m sure will happily read women) I wanted to mention a few new works by Egypt’s revolutionary women writers and translators. Sarah Carr: Sarah doesn’t yet have a book… Read More ›
Yesterday, I noted that the big controversy (so far) in the 2012 International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF, “Arabic Booker”) longlist is its surfeit of women. I quoted Susannah Tarbush: “Complaints about the low representation of women in a literary… Read More ›
Anglos have long been charged by a belief in Arab (hyper)sexuality. As Edward Said nods at in his pioneering Orientalism, this is in large part because of Anglo (hyper)reserve about s-e-x. Indeed, we might just as well talk about why Anglo writers can’t properly describe sex in their novels, and what they might learn from Saudi women.
This list came out earlier in the month, but it didn’t occur to me that any of the women on Arabian Business’s rundown of the “100 most powerful Arab women of 2011″ might be novelists or poets.
But there are a few, tucked in here and there.
I should have a piece in Al Masry Al Youm today that looks at different strands of Egyptian feminism (and alternatives to feminism) through the lens of women’s memoirs and novels.
