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‘A Night in Casablanca’: Bringing Mohamed Zafzaf Back to Life
It was thirteen years ago this month that Moroccan author Mohamed Zafzaf — the “godfather” of Moroccan literature – died in Casablanca. Although the French translation of his The Cockerel Egg received...
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Sonallah Ibrahim Part of Committee Setting Up ‘Mohamed Choukri International...
World literary awards are plentiful, although credible, transparent, and interesting ones less so. The Mohamed Choukri Foundation, named for the celebrated Moroccan author, recently announced the...
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Translation and Expectation: Which ‘For Bread Alone’ Are You Reading?
Yesterday, ArabLit posted about a new Mohamed Choukri International Award while making only slight mention of the circumstances under which Choukri’s internationally acclaimed al-Khubz al-Hafi was...
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Abdelfattah Kilito on ‘The Real Miracle’ of Translation and What Classical...
Moroccan novelist, essayist, and critic Abdelfattah Kilito has a new book out in English translation this fall: Arabs and the Art of Storytelling: A Strange Familiarity, co-translated by Mbarek Sryfi...
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Moroccan Writer Mohammed Zafzaf: ‘Disturbing, Intriguing, Shocking,...
Mbarek Syrfi, who co-translated The Monarch of the Square (2014) with Roger Allen, answers questions about Zafzaf’s importance to Moroccan literature, his style, and why he hasn’t been translated into...
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Hemingway Grants Go To Translation of Works by Abdellatif Laâbi, Mohamed Nedali
The Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the U.S. announced the 2014 recipients of the Hemingway Grant last month, and among the grant-ees were translations of works by two great Morrocan...
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Eating with Ibn Battuta
The Dubai International Writers’ Centre recently held a two-part session about Ibn Battuta’s extensive travels, led by their Writer-in-Residence Tim Mackintosh-Smith. Participants were treated to a...
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Mawred Grants for Young Writers Go To Rania Mamoun, Soukaina Habiballah
Ten Arab artists under 35 have been granted awards from Al-Mawred Al-Thaqafy as part of its 2014 Production Awards Program. Two are writers: They are Sudanese writer and activist Rania Mamoun and...
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Moroccan Writer Mahi Binebine on IMPAC’s 10-book Shortlist
As I wrote over at The Guardian when the IMPAC’s 142-book longlist was revealed late last year, its global outreach was decidedly underwhelming: Painting from the author’s website:...
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Mohammed Berrada: ‘Everything Has Yet To Be Done’
This dispatch is the first from the 2015 Abu Dhabi International Book Fair, which opens today: By Olivia Snaije Mohammed Berrada is considered one of Morocco’s most important contemporary writers. Born...
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Morocco in ‘Open Confrontation with the Arabic Language(s)’?
Morocco’s “National Coalition for Arabic” is reportedly up in arms over a Ramadan sitcom it says “mocks the Arabic language”; a government minister says speaking formal Arabic causes her “a fever”; a...
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‘Only Vagabonds Can Be Poets’
Translator André Naffis-Sahely is working on a forthcoming Selected Poems of Abdellatif Laâbi (Carcanet, 2016). As he does, poems have been trickling out here and there: From the author’s website The...
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Moroccan Writer and Scholar Fatema Mernissi, 75
Moroccan writer and scholar Fatema Mernissi, author of the acclaimed memoir Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood, has died at 75: Born in 1940, in Fes, Mernissi was celebrated for her...
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Why You Should Know Moroccan Author of Cult Classic ‘L’hôpital’
Today in NYC, poet and Dar al-Ma’mûn co-director Omar Berrada will give a talk about Ahmed Bouanani (1938-2011), author behind the cult classic L’hôpital and groundbreaking film Mirage. Despite his...
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Sights and Scenes from the 2016 Casablanca Book Fair
The 22nd Casablanca International Book Fair (SIEL) opened February 12 and will continue through the 21st. Olivia Snaije was there: More than 680 publishers from 44 countries are taking part in this...
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Tareq Bakari’s IPAF-shortlisted ‘Numedia’ Wins Morocco Book Award
Tareq Bakari’s Numedia (“نوميديا”), already shortlisted for the 2016 International Prize for Arabic Fiction, yesterday won a Morocco Book Award: Image from the author’s Facebook page. Numedia is...
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Tahar Ben Jelloun’s ‘About My Mother’ Wins 2016 PEN Promotes Award
Four books — a French graphic novel that tells a refugee’s story; a “costumbrismo” novel by Galician author Cristina Sánchez-Andrade; a collection of political essays by Mexican journalists and...
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Fouad Laroui and Emma Ramadan on How To Keep ‘Dassoukine’s Trousers’ Funny in...
This interview first appeared — in a tighter, faster-paced version — over at Bookwitty. Here at ArabLit, the longer version of our three-way chat: Translator Emma Ramadan with author Fouad Laroui in NY...
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Muhammad Zafzaf’s ‘The Elusive Fox’: Turning the Euro-American Story about...
From a review of Muhammad Zafzaf’s The Elusive Fox, trans. Mbarek Sryfi and Roger Allen, that can be read in full at Qantara, “One rule for them.” It opens: The ′60s generation of US writers was shaped...
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The First Abdellatif Laâbi Collection of 2016 Out Now
There are two volumes of poetry by Prix Goncourt winner Abdellatif Laâbi out in fresh English translations this year: The first, Beyond the Barbed Wire, is out from Carcanet this month. The second is...
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