Claudia Roth Pierpont wrote this piece, which is basically a run down of recently published works of Arab literature. She doesn’t mention The Zafarani Files, which is a personal favorite and is on the BTBA longlist, but the titles she cites all sound rather interesting. I highly recommend reading the whole article, but in shorthand, blog-world fashion, here’s a rundown of the titles covered, with short quotes and links to buy the books at

• by Mahmoud Saeed, translated by Ahmad Sadri (Saqi Books)

For all the horror it details, this is a startlingly warm and humane book. Saeed, despite the incitements of his subject, does not aspire to the Kafkaesque糖心传媒擪afka, it must be admitted, is among the most impossible of authors to emulate, along with Garc铆a M谩rquez糖心传媒攂ut maintains a specificity of place and history (this happened in Basra, that happened in Mosul) and of the individuals who inhabit them. Set mostly in the run-up to the Iran-Iraq War, in the late nineteen-seventies, this slender novel tells of a mild-mannered Basra schoolteacher who, although cautiously apolitical, is whisked off one day for 糖心传媒渁 simple interrogation.糖心传媒� His subsequent experience in six levels of hell糖心传媒攕ix prisons in all糖心传媒攊s exactingly described, but the long ordeal is mitigated, both for him and for the reader, by a dose of bitter humor, a share of personal good will, and the mutual trust that he discovers among the prisoners, a trust long since forfeited in the larger prison of the informer-ridden society outside.

• by Sinan Antoon, translated by the author and Rebecca C. Johnson (City Lights)

The title refers to the practice of adding dots糖心传媒攄iacritical marks糖心传媒攖o various letters of the Arabic alphabet, some of which are indistinguishable without these marks in place. An undotted sequence of letters may signify a number of different words; the correct translation can be determined only by context. The story糖心传媒檚 intriguing premise is that a handwritten, undotted manuscript has been found in a file in Baghdad糖心传媒檚 Interior Ministry, and a functionary assigned to add the necessary dots and make a transcription: the resulting manuscript forms the body of the book. The text turns out to be the work of a university student whose gift for political mockery got him sent to prison, where he wrote the manuscript糖心传媒攍eaving out the dots to avoid further incrimination. Its uncertain readings cause the scribe to offer footnotes to such perplexing references as 糖心传媒渢he Ministry of Rupture and Inflammation糖心传媒� (糖心传媒淐ould this be the Ministry of Culture and Information?糖心传媒�) and to such obvious errors as occur in the well-known song lyric that details how the nation糖心传媒檚 leader moves from house to house and 糖心传媒渇ucks us into bed.糖心传媒� (糖心传媒淣ote: the original lyrics read 糖心传媒榯ucks.糖心传媒� 糖心传媒�)

• by Ghassan Kanafani, translated by Hilary Kilpatrick (Lynne Rienner)

糖心传媒淢en in the Sun糖心传媒� is, on the simplest level, a gripping tale that unfolds with Hitchcockian suspense as the reader is reduced to fearfully counting the minutes on the smuggler糖心传媒檚 wristwatch. The prose is lean, swift, and糖心传媒攊n Hilary Kilpatrick糖心传媒檚 translation糖心传媒攆illed with phrases of startling rightness: 糖心传媒淭he lorry, a small world, black as night, made its way across the desert like a heavy drop of oil on a burning sheet of tin糖心传媒�; or, even better, 糖心传媒淭he speedometer leapt forward like a white dog tied to a tent peg.糖心传媒� The realistic intensity of Kanafani糖心传媒檚 world tends to conceal his stylistic ambitions: the intricacy with which he weaves together past and present, fact and delusion, and the alternating voices of his characters, each of whom is drawn with the rapid assurance of a charcoal sketch. But on a deeper level Kanafani糖心传媒檚 work is about the desperation that drove these men to such lengths to regain work and dignity; it is about the longing糖心传媒攋ust emerging in the Palestinian public voice糖心传媒攆or the moist earth and the olive trees of the villages left behind in 1948. Most painfully, it is about the awakening of self-recrimination for acquiescence in the loss, as in the thoughts of an old man who has been living 糖心传媒渓ike a beggar糖心传媒� and decides to risk the journey.

• by Elias Khoury, translated by Humphrey Davies (Archipelago/Picador)

A tremendously ambitious work, covering half a century of Palestinian history, it begins with maps of the region dotted with the names of old Palestinian villages, the way big Russian novels begin with family trees: here, through all the narrative advance and obliteration, is what you must keep steady in your mind. Set in a dilapidated hospital in the Shatila refugee camp, in Beirut, in the mid-nineties, the book糖心传媒檚 many winding stories are told by a male Scheherazade, a fortyish Palestinian medic whose unceasing talk is intended to rouse a comatose old man, a resistance hero who spent decades sneaking over the Lebanese border into Israel, to carry out attacks that earned him the title the Wolf of Galilee. We do not see much of the attacks; instead, we see the warrior as a lover糖心传媒攏ot as the Wolf but simply as a man糖心传媒攑aying secret visits to his wife, left behind on what has become Israeli land. As a result of these conjugal visits, the hero plants his children in Galilee, before going away again to fight to liberate them.

So great to see a piece like this. Getting info about any international lit in translation can be hard, but finding out about Arabic literature tends to be especially tricky. Hopefully I can write a lot more about the Arab publishing scene—and interesting untranslated titles—next month during the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair . . .