Language: Arabic

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

March 26, 2021  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Jacqueline Leung, MK Harb, and Vivian Szu-Chin Chih

The latest news from Hong Kong, Lebanon, and Taiwan!

This week, our writers bring you news from Hong Kong, Lebanon, and Taiwan. In Hong Kong, Voice & Verse Poetry Magazine is publishing a special section on Myanmar writing; in Lebanon, poet Zeina Hashem Beck’s second poetry collection will be published by Penguin; and in Taiwan, the 2021 Taipei Literary Festival has kicked off. Read on to find out more! 

Jacqueline Leung, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong

In a show of solidarity to the resistance efforts in Myanmar, Voice & Verse Poetry Magazine is publishing an English-language section on Myanmar, to be edited by poet, writer, and academic Tammy Lai-Ming Ho. The magazine will accept submissions until March 30 and has already announced that it will include some works in translation. So far, Thiri Zune’s translation of Nay Thit’s “With the Teeth of a Mad Flower” and Ko Ko Thett’s translation of Aung Khin Myint’s poem “Spring” will be in the upcoming issue. Both are timely responses to the military coup which has killed well over 200 people, including poets Myint Myint Zin and K Za Win, and has caused countrywide Internet blackout and crackdowns on the media. While international condemnation of Myanmar’s military leaders is escalating, many in Hong Kong identify with the resistance from the onset, especially with the fresh memory of the city’s own protests.

In addition to its efforts for Myanmar, Voice & Verse held an event discussing the American poet Louise Glück, winner of the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature, on World Poetry Day (March 21, 2021). Hosted by writer, poet, and critic Ian Pang in Cantonese, the event discussed Glück’s oeuvre, from her first poetry collection Firstborn (1968) to more recent works.

Works in translation also feature prominently in the forty-fifth Hong Kong International Film Festival, set to take place between April 1 and 12. With over 190 titles from fifty-eight countries and regions, the festival is proceeding in a hybrid format with in-theatre and online screenings as well as director discussions. This year’s showcase includes Wife of a Spy directed by Kurosawa Kiyoshi and Andrei Konchalovsky’s Dear Comrades!, which recently won Best Director and the Special Jury Prize respectively at the 2020 Venice International Film Festival; Golden Globes Best Foreign Language Film winner, Minari, by Korean-American director Lee Isaac Chung; and Japanese masterpieces in the event of Shokichu Cinema’s 100th anniversary. These already rich offerings are accompanied by a selection of newly restored classics from world and Chinese-language cinemas, recalling Parasite director Bong Joon-ho’s Golden Globe statement, that once one overcomes the one-inch barrier of subtitles, one gains access to many more amazing films and works of art.

MK Harb, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Lebanon

2022. Since the start of the pandemic and the global vaccine roll out, a number of hopes, projects, and “return to normal” discourse have been thrown onto that year. However, here at Asymptote, we are excited to hear that acclaimed Lebanese Poet Zeina Hashem Beck will debut a poetry collection with Penguin Books in the summer of 2022! Titled O, the collection will be a meditative reflection on the letter O and its numerous meanings. Hashem Beck previously won the 2016 May Sarton New Hampshire Poetry Prize for her book Louder than Hearts.

March is usually a generous month to us and we will share this generosity through some exciting Arab literature reading lists! The Arab lit Quarterly Spring issue is out with exciting writings and translations on the theme of “Song.” Guest edited by investigative journalist Karim Zidan, this issue has a far-reaching range from tenth-century poetry by the polymath Kushajim (in translation by Salma Harland) to a journey through Palestinian resistance folk music with Shaimaa Abulebda. Another reading list we are excited about is the Sheikh Zayed Book Award shortlist! Dominated by women authors from the Arab world, the list includes authors from Egyptian Iman Mersal to Lebanese Alawiya Sobh. Happy reading!

In translation highlights, acclaimed Lebanese author Hoda Barakat’s novel, which won the 2019 International Prize for Arabic Fiction, is out now with an English translation and a controversial title! Translated by another acclaimed translator, Marilyn Booth, the title of “Voices of the Lost” is seen by some as reductive to the devastating stories of migrants in the novel. Another work we are enamored with is the collection of short stories A Bed for the King’s Daughter written by Syrian author, Shahla Ujayli, whose past work was long listed for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction. The collection, translated by Sawad Hussain, with an important forward on biases in the literary market, uses surrealism and humor to address many of modernity’s malaises from alienation to the patriarchal gaze. READ MORE…

What’s New in Translation: March 2021

March 15, 2021  |  in New in Translation, Reviews  |  by Alice Banks, Carol Khoury, Maddy Robinson, and Rachel Farmer

The best in world literature from Iceland, Palestine, Algeria, and Japan!

This month, our selection of excellent new publications are representative of literature’s capacity for translating worldly phenomenon into language, converting the lived into the understood. From Iceland, a passionate and intimate call to response on the tragedies of environmental destruction; from Palestine, a monumental work of love and resistance from “the Virginia Woolf of Palestine,” Sahar Kalifeh; from Algeria, a sensual novel that treads the tenuous territory of colonialism’s aftereffects; and from Japan, the English-language debut of Akutagawa-winner Kikuko Tsumura, who with graceful humour and intrigue tackles the toxic concept of labour in the thrive of capitalism.  

on time and water

On Time and Water by Andri Snær Magnason, translated from the Icelandic by Lytton Smith, Open Letter, 2021

Review by Rachel Farmer, Chief Executive Assistant

When Greta Thunberg addressed the UN Climate Summit in September 2019, she choked back tears as she uttered the now infamous words: “How dare you?” Reactions to this display of emotion were mixed to say the least. Some showed discomfort, others concern for her wellbeing; some dismissed her outburst as manipulative, others ridiculed her. Her face and words were even immortalised in meme format. In displaying her anguish and rage so plainly, Thunberg violated the unspoken rule that seems to underpin much of the communication and discussion around climate change, wherein impassivity, stoicism, and detachment reign supreme.

In On Time and Water—part memoir, part interview, part impassioned treatise on the future of our planet—Andri Snær Magnason follows the young Swedish activist’s example, casting aside convention and delving into the emotional side of the climate crisis. In doing so, he embarks on a deeply humane and vulnerable exploration of what manmade climate change truly means for the planet—and for us. In this compelling hybrid of a book, translated sensitively by Lytton Smith, he explains how, a few years ago, he was called upon to defend a region in his country’s highlands from being destroyed in the name of energy production. Despite his deep admiration for the spiritual fervour with which Helgi Valtýsson, another Icelandic writer, wrote about the region in 1945, Magnason found himself unable to infuse the same passion into his defence. Bringing emotions into the discussion would have risked his arguments being dismissed as hysterical, doommongering, or hopelessly idealistic.

I’d found myself overwhelmed by melancholy at the unruly devastation that washed out this peerless region, yet I chose words that seemed moderate and inviting to readers. I used the prevailing language of liberalism, innovation, utilitarianism, and marketing. I discussed the area’s importance for Iceland’s image, its potential tourist income, the area’s research value, how the highlands were a magnet for foreign currency as a filming location for movies or commercials. [. . .] We live in times when money is the measure of reality. I couldn’t argue nature’s right to exist, its essential value, by saying that we might find God’s all-encompassing expanse there. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

February 26, 2021  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Carol Khoury, Jacqueline Leung, and Kwan Ann Tan

The latest news from Palestine, Hong Kong, and Malaysia!

This week, our writers bring you news from Palestine, Hong Kong, and Malaysia. In Palestine, the world has been remembering the renowned writer Mourid Barghouti, who passed away this month; in Hong Kong, Dorothy Tse’s first novel to appear in English, Owlish, will be released by Fitzcarraldo Editions and Graywolf Press; and in Malaysia, two new anthologies celebrate Malaysian writing. Read on to find out more! 

Carol Khoury, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Palestine

If it weren’t for COVID-19, the narrow streets of Deir Ghassana would have been jammed with mourners on Valentine’s day. Just like many other villages around the world, Deir Ghassana—the small serene village to the north of Ramallah in the central hills of Palestine— usually celebrates Valentine’s day, but not this year: for Mourid Barghouti passed away.

Born on a hot day in July 1944 in one of the village’s old houses, Barghouti grew to become a beloved Palestinian poet, performer, public speaker, and memoirist, albeit living most of his life in exile. He wrote the popular memoir I Saw Ramallah, which chronicled his return to the West Bank in 1996 and was translated by novelist Ahdaf Soueif. He also wrote a follow-up memoir, I Was Born There, I Was Born Here, which tells his story from 1998 to 2010, translated by Humphrey Davies. He published more than a dozen collections of poems, and a collection of his work, Midnight and Other Poems, was translated by his life partner, the great Egyptian novelist Radwa Ashour (1946–2014).

In his foreword to the English version of I Saw Ramallah, Edward Said wrote of Barghouti’s treatment of loss experienced in exile that, “it is Barghouti’s extended rebuttal and resistance against the reasons for that loss that endows his poetry with substance and gives this narrative its positive valence.” The loss of such a writer is great, but Barghouti will always be remembered. His legacy is extremely rich, not only because he was one of the most articulate defenders of the Palestinian cause, but because his writing has encapsulated the collective agony and sumoud (steadfastness) of the Palestinian people everywhere.

In his memoir, Mourid writes about the loss of his private days—his birthday and his anniversary—as author Ghassan Kanafani was assassinated on the date of the first, and cartoonist Naji al-Ali on the second. It seems life is only determined to keep the legacy alive. Sadly for Mourid and Radwa’s only son, the poet Tamim Barghouti (b. 1977), February 14 will be a different celebration from now on.

To get a taste of his writings, a collection of his translated works is published on ArabLit and a wide-ranging interview by Maya Jaggi, published in The Guardian (2008). READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

February 12, 2021  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by MK Harb, Sarah Moore, and Vivian Szu-Chin Chih

The latest news from Lebanon, Taiwan, and France!

This week, our writers bring you the latest news from Lebanon, Taiwan, and France. In Lebanon, translator Dr. Mona Kareem has won the National Endowment for the Arts Award and the Barjeel Poetry Prize winners have been announced; in Taiwan, the February issue of INK literary magazine presents work by sixteen Taiwanese authors on “A Memo for Literature of the Next Decade”; and in France, Vanessa Springora’s bestselling memoir about sexual abuse will be released in English translation. Read on to find out more! 

MK Harb, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Lebanon

In Lebanon, the cultural world and the literary sphere has been rocked by the news of the assassination of Lokman Slim. Slim was a prolific writer and intellectual, and was an influential member of the cultural and political community, opening his research and documentation practice UMAM in southern Beirut. A celebration of his life and work was held on February 11.

In translation news, Dr. Mona Kareem, translator of Octavia Butler’s Kindred into Arabic, won the National Endowment for the Arts Award. Her award supports the translation from the Arabic of the poetry collection Falcon with Sun Overheard by Ra’ad Abdulqadir, a pioneer of Iraqi poetry. Here is Dr. Kareem’s haunting translation of his poem “A Song for the Lightning Bird.” Interested in learning more about the Arabic prose poem? Then listen to author Huda J. Fakhreddine’s online talk about it at Dartmouth College!

In more thrilling translation news, Sawad Hussain’s translation from the Arabic of A Bed for the King’s Daughter is being published by University of Texas Press. Written by Syrian author Shahla Ujayli, whose past work was long-listed for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, this collection of short stories is experimental, witty, and loaded with uncanny images dealing with modernity, alienation, and patriarchy.  READ MORE…

Section Editors’ Highlights: Winter 2021

February 8, 2021  |  in News  |  by Bassam Sidiki, Caridad Svich, Eva Heisler, Garrett Phelps, Lee Yew Leong, and Sam Carter

Our section editors present their favorite works from our Winter 2021 issue!

Our Winter 2021 issue marks a decade of diving into the languages of the world (our archive now boasts 113 of them!) in all their incredible singularity and variegation. Spanning thirty-one countries, this milestone edition feels like a fitting way to honor a decade of hard work behind the scenes. After hearing from our blog editors last week, let’s pass the mic to the very editors who had a hand in putting together the issue itself.

“Is it a Comedy? Is it a Tragedy?” Thomas Bernhard asks in our debut issue from January 2011. Ten years later, Brazilian author Adelice Souza’s fever-dream of a story (in Padma Viswanathan’s pitch-perfect translation) provides a direct enjoinder: “The play wasn’t a comedy, nor was it a tragedy . . . It was a drama very specifically for those two women.” Just as in Bernhard’s story, the point is not the play at all—we hardly know what the play is about, other than the fact that its two actresses play a lonely woman and her dog, and that tragedy ensues when one demands to switch roles with the other. In contrast to Bernhard, who focuses squarely on the theatre-goer, Souza makes it all about the two actresses whose eight years of traveling with the play to multiple cities have “put them through every type of relationship.” It’s not a story one imagines being plotted out; rather, the work feels like it has been ejected, like toothpaste from a tube, sentence by exhilarating sentence. In the “Brave New World Literature” Special Feature, we also come full circle but in a different way via the return of frequent contributor Jeremy Tiang, who debuted as a translator in our first issue. Combining pop-cultural references with theory, “The World Is Not Enough” is full of quotable gems, but nowhere is Tiang more on-point than when he muses, “Perhaps if the dominant anglophone culture actually acknowledged itself to be part of the world, rather than treating ‘world literature’ as a spice rack to save itself from total blandness, more than three percent of books published in the United States would be in translation?” Finally, anyone who is curious about the workings of a magazine of world literature other than our own will find plenty of food for thought in John Freeman’s riveting piece on how he remade Granta into a global publication.

—Lee Yew Leong, Fiction Editor and ”Brave New World Literature“ Special Feature Editor

Max Rojas is a constant enthusiasm of mine and so I was thrilled to showcase a pretty sizable excerpt from Zane Koss and Gerónimo Sarmiento Cruz’s translation—the very first in English—in all its shining, breathless glory. Even though it’s a mere sliver of a doorstop-sized poem, it’s an excellent sample of Rojas’ talent and an overdue introduction for the Anglosphere. The language of Bodies is both baroque and ephemeral, rugged and philosophical, and its tone swings between that of a theologico-political treatise and a declaration of war. It’s some of this last century’s densest and most sophisticated Spanish-language verse, and some of the most woefully unknown.

—Garrett Phelps, Poetry Editor READ MORE…

Blog Editors’ Highlights: Winter 2021

February 3, 2021  |  in News  |  by Sarah Moore and Xiao Yue Shan

Dive into our wide-ranging tenth-anniversary issue with our blog editors.

In ten years of Asymptote, we’ve brought you a stunning array of texts, from writers familiar to those brought out newly into the light, words of conviction, ardor, invention, and precision have graced our pages, and our history-making Winter 2021 issue is no different. Featuring three new languages—Cebuano, Kahmiri, and Marathi—and deploying works from thirty-one countries in total, we are additionally featuring a curated selection of writings in our Brave New World Literature feature, which presents a myriad of talented voices navigating and graphing the changing landscape of world literature. Here, our blog editors are rounding up their selections of the pieces of the Winter 2021 edition that ignite and inspire.

The notion of a brave new world literature indicates—beyond the trepidations upon coming towards the unknown—the writer’s own, omnipresent fears about their own craft. In writing, one is always fighting against the futility of the word, how it falters to encompass even a single sensation, let alone the impatient fabric of the milieu. Each piece of writing is measured up against its time to determine its true subject, and the works included in our landmark Winter 2021 issue has to bear the comparison to a moment in history that comes close to being immeasurable, both in the frenzied proceedings of markable events, and in the psychic tracks it has carved across the globe, as each person was forced to consider—in distinctly unequal polarities of rumination or emergency—what it means to have lived through, to be living through, such a time.

This seamless interchange between writer, reader, and the present shared between them—the writing must level all three terrains while insulating its cargo of ideas. As I move through this marvelous gallery of texts that the latest issue of Asymptote gathers, I was struck by the various and telling constellations they formed with this precise moment.

In Jan Němec’s excerpts from Ways of Writing About Love, there’s a beguiling—and somewhat precious—self-conscious tone, rendered with grace by David Short, that runs through the three proses, almost as if the writer has already recognized that the bold display on the awning of the text—those two feared and wasted words, writing and love—has already pushed the language deeply into that murky deluge where only those two most indulgent peoples, writers and lovers, would willingly submerge themselves. But as the oral rhythm of the story taps itself out (Němec and Short are to be commended for their preternatural sense of how the voice paces itself), and the symphony of the mind conducts its singular cacophony, one comes to decipher its inner textures, in which writing and love are scrutinized for the particularly heightened quality one achieves during such occupations—attention to how time, and knowledge, and sensuality congregate. READ MORE…

We’re Reached Our Milestone Tenth Anniversary! 🎉

January 28, 2021  |  in News  |  by Lee Yew Leong

And we’re celebrating with a new issue (and some very big names in world literature)!

Dear reader,

I’m thrilled to present “Brave New World Literature,” our special milestone edition marking ten full years of curating the very best in contemporary letters. Highlights include an exclusive last interview with James Salter conducted before he died in 2015, new translations of Alfred Döblin and Alain Mabanckou, as well as a trio of essays by intellectual heavyweight Eliot Weinberger, former Granta editor John Freeman, and frequent contributor Jeremy Tiang—all suggesting a “culturally multidirectional” way forward for the next decade.

In addition to featuring a “writer’s writer” (the aforementioned James Salter), we’re proud to debut in English a “true poet’s poet” (the Mexican Max Rojas) in a roster that also includes poet superstars Najwan Darwish and Carlos de Assumpção. Elsewhere, fellow Brazilian writer Adelice Souza and Hungarian author Anna Mécs give us a pair of stunning fictions in which women perform (or postpone) their deaths, while our first nonfiction lineup under new Nonfiction Editor Bassam Sidiki sees a fascinating pseudo-scientific colonial document answered with a modern memoir of Egyptian politics. In light of the recent protests by Navalny supporters all across Russia, Artur Solomonov’s drama—also about enacting death, while portraying the machinery of state propaganda—could not be more timely: The play was in fact considered so politically inflammatory that it has only ever been staged underground. All of this is illustrated by talented guest artist the Australia-based Naomi Segal. READ MORE…

The Queen’s Argot: The Language of Chess Around the World

January 21, 2021  |  in Essays  |  by Allison Braden

Players worldwide understand the pieces . . . but our understanding . . . depends in part on what we call them.

Netflix miniseries The Queen’s Gambit illustrated the international culture of chess. As it turns out, the game’s spread around the globe is a story of translation. In this brisk and brainy rundown, Editor-at-Large Allison Braden tackles its evolution through time and space, setting up a board in which pawns can be farmers, bishops can be fools, and queens can be counselors.

In December of last year, Netflix miniseries The Queen’s Gambit smashed viewership records for a limited-run series on the site. In the show’s first month of streaming, over 62 million people around the world tuned in to the story of a young woman who overcomes several challenges in her quest to become a world chess champion in the 1960s. The series was based on Walter Tevis’s 1983 novel of the same name, and like readers before them, viewers rooted for plucky chess prodigy Beth Harmon. Her eventual triumph was, for many, a bright spot at the end of a long and difficult year.

You won’t become a grandmaster by watching the series. (In fact, one of the only aspects of the show that pro chess players took issue with was the speed of the games. In a concession to viewers, they were faster paced than matches at real tournaments.) But The Queen’s Gambit is a crash course in the culture of chess. It’s fiercely competitive, requires visual and strategic intelligence, and remains extremely male dominated (despite studies showing men aren’t inherently better at the game). Chess is also truly universal—and where there’s an international pastime, there are translators.

In the show, Harmon travels to Mexico, France, and the USSR. As her skill grows, her competitors increasingly hail from foreign countries, and as it becomes clear that the ultimate test of her ability will come in Moscow, she begins to study Russian. In the heady final scenes, commentators relay her moves in a variety of languages for listeners around the world. After The Queen’s Gambit was released, interest in chess boomed. One of the most popular ways to play is online. Chess.com boasts users from dozens of countries, and they can all play one other. Like many sports, chess transcends language; in a way, it is its own language. Players worldwide understand the pieces: the king’s hesitance, the queen’s might. The bishop, which can only move diagonally, speaks his own sideways tongue. READ MORE…

Translation Tuesday: “The Ashes of Hell” by Brahim Darghouthi

January 19, 2021  |  in Translations  |  by Essam M. Al-Jassim

I stared at the neatly made bed and whispered, “Forgive me, my dear, if I have to violate your secrets today.”

For this week’s Translation Tuesday, a son mourning his mother’s death unearths secrets of his family history in Brahim Darghouthi’s short story, “The Ashes of Hell”. Our unnamed narrator finds miscellaneous keepsakes of his parents in a locked box, including letters from his father, a Muslim murdered by the Nazis in an apparent case of mistaken identity. Reflecting upon his mother’s subsequent anti-Semitic resentment, our protagonist recalls a deeper pain beneath this prejudiced demeanour. A short but powerful portrait of compounding grief and the often-destructive ways we deal with it, “The Ashes of Hell” delves into the ethics of family secrets and our obligations to the dead. 

When I returned from the cemetery that bleak and fateful morning, I tapped on my mother’s door softly as if she were still lying asleep on her sickbed. I entered on tiptoe and went straight to her antique, oak coffer, decorated with all the colors of the rainbow.

Her distinct fragrance still hung in the air. I stared at the neatly made bed and whispered, “Forgive me, my dear, if I have to violate your secrets today.”

Taking me by surprise, she answered, “The coffer’s key is under the pillow, my darling.”

The scent of heaven immediately struck me as soon as I turned the key in the lock and slowly raised the paneled top. Some small items were neatly arranged inside: sandalwood, amber, small bottles of rosewater, a yellow quince, a small book of dhikr the size of a hand, three new candles, and a fourth that was half melted.

My mother had always hated power switches; to her, they resembled the fangs of rabid dogs. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

January 15, 2021  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Allison Braden, Carol Khoury, and David Boyd

The latest news from Argentina, Japan, and Palestine!

This week our writers bring you exciting news from Argentina, Japan, and Palestine! In Argentina, the legalization of abortion has been celebrated and supported by many, including renowned feminist writer Nora Domínguez; in Japan, leading women writers and their translators will be in conversation for the Japan Foundation New York, whilst translator Yukiko Konosu shared her recommended new reads from Japan, including Rin Usami; and in Palestine, four great new works of Palestine literature are soon to be published in English. Read on to find out more! 

Allison Braden, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Argentina 

Two days before 2020 slid into history and memory, an anxious crowd gathered outside Argentina’s Congress in Buenos Aires. They watched the Senate debate on big screens and the summer heat dissipated as day turned into night, Tuesday turned into Wednesday. Many—though not all—of those who stood outside wore green scarves, the symbol of a yearlong movement to legalize abortion in the historically conservative country. In the small hours of Wednesday morning, after a long and suspenseful Senate session, they found out that their work had paid off: Congress legalized voluntary abortion through the fourteenth week of pregnancy.

Several of the pro-choice activists who advocated for this major legislation were writers. The day before the senators took up the bill, a collection of Argentina’s most notable writers, including Claudia Piñeiro, Florencia Abbate, Agustina Bazterrica, and Gabriela Saidon, released a statement and video expressing their support. “The green wave puts an end to hypocrisies, inequalities, injustices and replaces a long dark violence with dignity,” they wrote. “Like the deep and living heartbeat of the sea, it instills in us a pulse to continue fighting.”

Nora Domínguez was among the writers who endorsed the statement. She’s one of three directors of an ambitious project to publish the history of Argentina’s literature through a feminist lens. The first of six volumes, En la intemperie: poéticas de la fragilidad y la revuelta (In the Open: Poetics of Fragility and Revolt) was published by Eduvim late last year, but it’s chronologically the last in the series, focusing on the period between 1990 and 2019. The work features a collection of analysis and criticism from Argentina’s leading feminist thinkers—part of the project’s larger effort to give form to “certain absences, not to build a counter-canon but rather to provoke detours, scandalous stops, fissures, divisions, and contradictions” in the existing canon. In a December interview, Domínguez confirmed that Argentina has experienced a boom in recent years of new voices in the country’s literature, not just women but trans writers and young people as well. This century’s feminism is a culmination of both feminist and literary genealogies. The work to interrogate and revise a patriarchal canon and the work to advocate for laws that respect women’s autonomy go hand in hand. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

December 4, 2020  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Clémence Lucchini, MK Harb, and Thuy Dinh

The latest news from Lebanon, the Vietnamese diaspora, and France!

This week, our writers bring you the latest news from Lebanon, the Vietnamese diaspora, and France. In Lebanon, Jadaliyya has published an essay on the late Lebanese poet Iliya Abu Madi and Lebanese author Nasri Atallah has been included in a new anthology, Haramcy; in the Vietnamese diaspora, December 6 marks the 183th birthday of Petrus Ký, a prominent Vietnamese scholar who helped to improve the cultural understanding between French-colonized Vietnam and Europe; and in France, whilst bookshops have suffered from national lockdowns, a new translation of poems by contemporary poet Claire Malroux has been released. Read on to find out more! 

MK Harb, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Lebanon

Arab sci-fi lovers rejoice! An Arabic translation of the late American science fiction author Octavia Butler’s Kindred is coming out with Takween Publishing. Dr. Mona Kareem Kareem, a writer, literary scholar, and Arabic-English literary translator, worked on the Arabic manuscript during her residency at Princeton University. She will be holding an online talk, “To Translate Octavia Butler: Race, History, and Sci-Fi,” on December 7. Tune in as you wait for the manuscript with sci-fi jitters! In other translation news, Kevin Michael Smith, a scholar and translator of global modernist poetry, translated two poems by Saadi Youssef for Jadaliyya. Yousef is a prolific writer, poet, and political activist from Iraq and we are delighted to see more of his work profiled in English. Also on Jadaliyya is this beautiful rumination on the late Lebanese poet Iliya Abu Madi and his political imagination. Abu Madi wrote spellbinding poetry and was part of the twentieth-century Mahjar movement in the United States, which included the renowned Lebanese author, Gibran Khalil Gibran.

In publishing news, Bodour Al-Qasimi, founder and CEO of Kalimat Group, an Emirati publishing house for Arabic books, has been announced as the president of the International Publishers Association! Al-Qasimi has tirelessly worked on expanding the scope of the Arab publishing industry and we are happy to see her achieve this feat. Award-winning artist and cultural entrepreneur, Zahed Sultan, is seeking to release Haramcy, an anthology with twelve writers from the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia, including Lebanese author Nasri Atallah. It is set to be published with Unbound Books and the anthology addresses pertinent themes of love, invisibility, and belonging. In the spirit of the holidays, if you are feeling generous and capable of donating, then consider contributing to the Haramcy Fund.

We know the holidays are upon us and you are looking forward to cozying up with a book or two (or five in our case!). We have some new Arabic literature in translation for you to read during the holidays! The Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize shortlist has been announced! Another shortlist we are excited about is the Warwick Women in Translation Prize, which features Thirteen Months of Sunrise by Sudanese author, Rania Mamoun, translated from Arabic by Elisabeth Jaquette.

Thuy Dinh, Editor-at-Large, reporting from the Vietnamese Diaspora

December 6, 2020 marks the 183th birthday of Petrus Ký, also called Trương Vĩnh Ký, whose prolific achievements as scholar, translator, and publisher helped broaden the cultural understanding between French-colonized Vietnam and Europe. His vanguard efforts popularized chữ quốc ngữ, or modern Romanized script—leading to its official adoption as Vietnam’s national language in the early twentieth century. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches From the Front Lines of World Literature

November 27, 2020  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Carol Khoury, José García Escobar, and Kwan Ann Tan

The latest news from Central America, Palestine, and Malaysia!

This week, our writer’s bring you the latest news from Central America, Palestine, and Malaysia. Central America’s biggest book fair, FILGUA, has begun, whilst José Luis Perdomo Orellana received Guatemala’s most prestigious literary award; Palestine Writes Literature Festival has begun online, featuring over seventy writers and activists, including Angela Davis and Fady Joudah; and in Malaysia, readers have mourned the passing of prominent writer Salleh Ben Joned, whilst Georgetown Literary Festival has featured writers including Ho Sok Fong. Read on to find out more! 

José García Escobar, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Central America

After many delays and obvious setbacks, Central America’s biggest book fair, FILGUA, started yesterday. As a virtual book fair, FILGUA will feature over 140 online activities, book presentations, and conversations among prominent authors, journalists, and activists, such as Daniel Krauze (Mexico), Olga Wornat (Argentina), Rigoberta Menchú (Guatemala), and Javier Castillo (Spain). They have also announced that next year’s FILGUA, as planned for this year’s, will be celebrated alongside Central America’s biggest literary festival, Centro América Cuenta.

In November, writer and journalist José Luis Perdomo Orellana received the Miguel Ángel Asturias National Prize in Literature—Guatemala’s most prestigious literary prize. José Luis is best known for La última y nos vamos, a collection of interviews with Gunther Grass, Nadine Gordimer, José Saramago, and others. Also in November, indie giants Catafixia Editorial announced they will reissue Eugenia Gallardo’s most famous novel No te apresures a llegar a la Torre de Londres, porque la Torre de Londres no es el Big Ben.

Finally, the famed Guatemalan author Eduardo Halfon recently revealed the cover of his upcoming new book Canción, shortly after The New York Review shared an excerpt. Canción is out in January with Libros del Asteriode.

Carol Khoury, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Palestine

If you are still searching for a silver lining of the dark COVID-19 cloud, here’s one to consider: five days of virtual readings, talks, and performances celebrating Palestinian literature.

Palestine Writes Literature Festival, originally scheduled to take place in New York City in March 2020 (with the postponement announced due to the pandemic), will now take place virtually 2–6 December 2020. READ MORE…

Weekly Updates from the Front Lines of World Literature

November 20, 2020  |  in Dispatches, News, Weekly Roundup  |  by Darren Huang, Eva Wissting, and MK Harb

This week's latest news from Lebanon, Taiwan, and Sweden!

This week, our writers bring you news from Lebanon, Taiwan, and Sweden. In Lebanon, the three-day festival Electronic Literature Day will feature writers including Rabih Alameddine and Raafat Majzoub; in Taiwan, the writer Liu Wu-hsiung, known by his pen name, Qi Deng-sheng, is being mourned after passing away and a recent exhibition has featured the works of the late Taiwanese poets Yang Mu and Lo Fu; and in Sweden, writer Jonas Hassen Khemiri was in line for the National Book Award’s Translated Literature prize. Read on to find out more! 

MK Harb, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Lebanon

Fernweh! Or “a longing for far-off places, especially those not yet visited.” I recently learned the meaning of this German word on our newly developed “Untranslatable Words” column on Instagram (yes, that’s right we are on Instagram now!). To remedy this longing, which many of us are grappling with, check out this stellar lineup of writers on Electronic Literature Day, a three-day online literary festival featuring writers, thinkers, and practitioners in dynamic formats (November 24-26). The festival is co-organized by Barakunan, an independent publisher and art collective based in Beirut and Berlin. It will feature some of Lebanon’s finest, from acclaimed author Rabih Alameddine, writer and artist Raafat Majzoub, and cultural and social activist Dayna Ash.

This month, the translation news across the Arab region is abundant! Yasmine Seale won the 2020 Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize for poetry. We’ve previously highlighted Seale’s poetic and engrossing translation of Aladdin that came out with W. W. Norton in 2018. Sawad Hussain sat down with the Anglo-Omani society to discuss translating Arabic literature and the emotional mechanisms involved in bringing the texts “to life” in English. Hussain is the winner of two English PEN Translates awards and in the podcast, she discusses and contextualizes transgender narratives in Oman through the prism of translating The Shadow of Hermaphroditus by Badriyya al-Badri. Here at Asymptote, we are excited about Arabic children’s literature in translation! The English translation of Sonia Nimr’s Wondrous Journeys in Strange Lands from Interlink Books will debut on November 24! It is a feminist folktale unfolding through the journeys of a young Palestinian woman by the name of Qamar. Marcia Lynx Qualey, founder of Arablit Quarterly, worked on the translation. She previously gave an interview to Asymptote in 2017. Finally, on November 24 the shortlist for the 2020 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation will be announced. This year’s prize saw fourteen entries in fiction and poetry, with excellent nominees such as Ibtisam Azem’s The Book of Disappearance translated by Iraqi novelist and scholar, Sinan Antoon. READ MORE…

Our Fall 2020 Issue Is Here!

October 15, 2020  |  in News  |  by Lee Yew Leong

Feat. Andrés Neuman, Ariana Harwicz, and Rabindranath Tagore amid new work from 32 countries, including a Dutch Special Feature

We are proud to present the Fall 2020 issue of Asymptote, debuting new work from 32 countries:.  

This cornucopia of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, drama, reviews, and more includes such treats as a sparkling new translation of Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore’s century-old fiction, an exclusive interview with rising star Andrés Neuman, and Elisabeth S. Clark’s polyphonic book concertos. 

Perfectly timed to coincide with Marieke Lucas Rijneveld and Michele Hutchison winning the 2020 International Booker Prize, our Dutch Literature Feature, guest curated by Hutchison, zooms in on the emerging and established voices of a small but mighty country. Here you can sample the English debuts of Curaçao-born Radna Fabias, whose first collection swept up an unprecedented number of major poetry prizes, and of Sinan Çankaya, whose best-selling memoir My Innumerable Identities recounts his efforts to combat racism in the Dutch police from the inside—only to be othered for his Turkish origins. 

Elsewhere, Ali Lateef’s bittersweet “The Belle and Gazelle Statue” uses a public monument to illustrate the changing face of Tripoli after the 2011 Libyan Civil War. The unease of our current moment is captured in Ariana Harwicz’s “Longevity,” a cathartic tale about the effects of a pandemic-caused lockdown on a small rural community in France. Somewhere between nature writing and memoir stands Itō Hiromi’s essay on migratory plants and how the concept of “the Other” manifests in different cultures. The lure of the foreign propels both Vadim Muratkhanov’s dispatch from Tashkent’s labyrinthine Tezikova market and Hungarian essayist Noémi Kiss’s travel into the remote wonders of Azerbaijan.

Wherever we are, we find comfort in the global literary voices of our time, for even when they reveal harsh truths about our world, they give us hope, inspire mutual understanding and heal divisions. Please help us spread the word about Asymptote’s latest issue by downloading and distributing our Fall 2020 flyer/postcard, or by posting about it on Facebook or Twitter. 

To promote this brand-new issue, we’re holding another giveaway contest: Share any of our #Fall2020 posts on social media to stand a chance of winning an Asymptote Book Club subscription. Every retweet or share will be counted, and there’s no limit to the number of entries you can enter. We’ll announce the lucky winner on Monday, November 2!