10 Arabic titles that should be translated into English

With Sharjah as London Book Fair’s guest of honour in 2022, the time is nigh – nay, now – for publishers to acquire Arabic titles for translation. But where to start? Unlike other languages such as Korean or Swedish, which have robust agenting infrastructure, very few Arab authors have agents to get them through the door. As such, the majority of Arabic titles that one finds in English have been championed by a translator (not necessarily always the one on the by-line). Translators are the ones with their fingers on the pulse, their ears to the ground. They stay abreast of titles winning critical acclaim and those with an energetic fanbase. The list below of must-translate titles includes not only two of my own recommendations but those of some of my esteemed colleagues, too, because it would be unfathomable to come up with such a list without turning to them for their invaluable input.1. Inaam Kachachi’s The Outcast (Dar al-Jadeed, 2017) Luke Leafgren – winner of the 2018 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation – advocates for The Outcast, “a story of three characters whose lives intersect across continents and decades. Two are based on real people: an Iranian-Iraqi woman, Taji, one of the first female journalists in Baghdad in the 1940s; and a young Palestinian man, Mansour, who falls in love with her in Karachi before emigrating to Colombia. Through their eyes, the reader experiences many of the political and cultural events that shaped the Arab... Continue reading at 'British Council global'

[ British Council global | 2021-06-29 14:19:46 UTC ]

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