Arabic literature can be translated inasmuch as it has to be translated. Why? Because the reality Arabs encounter stretches beyond the Arab World, and thus does not fit the orderly context the Arabic language requires to keep on being as categorical as it has been for centuries.
The price a nation has to pay for boasting a language carved in stone is the cumbersomeness of its notions. But first, before Arabs face the Sphinx, they have to make sure they recognize both their mother tongue and their fatherland. We are just here to provide a space where they can shelve their paralysis by putting their stances into perspective.
Contemporary Arabic Literature, translated into English
Finalist of the “One Thousand Nights and Awakening” literary contest Gilisia is a magical land that is said to have been forged by the wind from Eden that Eve stole when she was banished together with our father Adam to God’s backyard. Afterward, it was inherited by the descendants of her pious children. The story […]
The Arui is a cave bordering on the Beautiful Region, that lies around 200 kilometers away from the capital, in the Tafilah Governorate. It provides goat hunters shelter for the night during the hunting season, which takes place in October, and is bounded on the East by a green landscape with streams and waterfalls, and […]
His cart is brimming with neatly baked cookies and pies, which are covered by a thin insect-screening mesh. Every morning, he sets out at dawn while the city is still sleeping to earn his daily bread. He trundles his wheelbarrow toward the al-Boukharia market in downtown Amman. He pushes it through several neighborhoods before reaching […]
