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
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 […]
The fierce eyes of the forlorn hope of building a bridge between the dawn and the dusk of civilization that is the city of Alexandria cast a plaintive glance over us as we wended our way through the bustling streets. Like a mother, she carries us on her bosom, looks after us and decides for […]
The electricity failed and the house sitting on the shore of Lake Qarun was plunged into pitch-black darkness. He counted on the reflection of his familiar surroundings on the still waters of the lake to allay his fears of hidden perils, but when he went out on the balcony, the moonless night revealed itself as […]
I decided to spend a few minutes observing him from afar before letting him know I had arrived. He was like a magnet, like what the homeland is to those who have been forced into exile, like the family one wrongly thought one could live without. I looked at him while he smoked, taking one […]
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 […]