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Palestinian playwright Valantina Abu Oqsa on 'I Am Free'

Palestinian playwright Valantina Abu Oqsa 
16 Sep 2012
In late August, organizers of the Etel Adnan Award for Women Playwrights announced that their 2012 award would go to Palestinian playwright Valantina Abu Oqsa for “I Am Free.” Abu Oqsa's play, which tells the stories of...
Yes

After police raid, state reconciles with Al-Nabi Daniel book vendors

Book market on Al-Nabi Daniel Street is destroyed, Alexandria, 7 September 2012. Alexandria security services destroyed a book market on Al-Nabi Daniel Street in the early hours of Friday morning on orders from the newly-appointed governor, Mohamed Atta Abbas, prompting an outcry from culture officials, activists and writers.
10 Sep 2012
ALEXANDRIA — Despite being surrounded by the ruins of neighboring businesses — book-selling kiosks identical to his own — Ibrahim Soueilam is in a good mood. Not because of the misfortune befalling his competition, but...
Yes

Running through Ramallah

  Guy Mannes-Abbott's “In Ramallah, Running” is a collaborative project that draws the city through texts and artwork. Image courtesy of Black Dog Publishing
09 Sep 2012
Ramallah has a shining international image: it has restaurants, nightclubs, culture, fun. In Joe Sacco’s pioneering graphic novel “Palestine,” all the “hepcat Arabs” are from Ramallah. But where did Ramallah...
Yes

Style is the honor of writing: A chat with Mustafa Zikri

02 Sep 2012
The fourth floor on which writer Mustafa Zikri resides does not keep out the hustle and bustle of Helwan’s streets. We hear the sound of gunshots; Zikri wonders whether people are celebrating a wedding or having a fight. But the...
Yes

Beyond memory: Hadiya Hussein’s uniquely Iraqi story of non-love and loss

26 Aug 2012
  Most of Iraq’s celebrated authors live and write outside their country: Fadhil al-Azzawi is in Berlin; Sinan Antoon is in New York City; Inaam Kachachi is in Paris; Mahmoud Saeed is in Chicago; Hassan Blasim is in Finland; Ali...
Yes

The sounds of ‘Sunset Oasis’

Egyptian novelist Bahaa Taher
15 Aug 2012
“I don’t mean to say that I am more intelligent than he, or that I see things he is incapable of seeing. It may be that it is I who am incapable of understanding what interests him, though I have tried and am still trying. This...
Yes

When Dracula speaks Arabic

11 Aug 2012
  When Egyptian author Ahmed Khaled Tawfik first launched his hit horror book series “Ma Waraa al-Tabee’a” (Beyond The Natural World) in 1993, he found nothing better to begin with than the character of Dracula. In...
Yes

Confessions of a young writer in 'The Waiting Lounge'

Shorouk Ilhamy's short story collection "Sahat al-Entezar"
02 Aug 2012
Much of Shorouk Ilhamy’s first story collection, “Sahat al-Entezar” (The Waiting Lounge), seems to be about despair, disappointment and injustice. But a shimmer of hope also permeates from some of the stories. The abrupt...
Yes

'Metro' available to friends, not family

Metropolitan Books published an English transaltion of Magdy El Shafee's graphic novel "Metro" in June 2012.
31 Jul 2012
"Metro,” Magdy El Shafee’s fast-paced first graphic novel, is now available in Italian and in English. The heist thriller will soon be published in Lebanon in its original Arabic, but thanks to the Egyptian Court of...
Yes

Exploring Cairo’s literary streets

Dar al-Shorouk published an Arabic translation of "The Literary Atlas of Cairo" by critic Samia Mehrez in early 2012.
26 Jul 2012
We all learn about cities through fiction, from the experiences of the stories' narrators and protagonists. Even when we live in the very same city where a story is set, we can sometimes develop new relationships with the places...
Yes

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