The Essential Yusuf Idris

The Essential Yusuf Idris PDF Author: Yūsuf Idrīs
Publisher: American Univ in Cairo Press
ISBN: 9789774162428
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
The only fiction collection available in English translation by the Arab world's greatest short-story writer of the twentieth century Yusuf Idris (1927-91), who belonged to the same generation of pioneering Egyptian writers as Naguib Mahfouz and Tawfiq al-Hakim, is widely celebrated as the father of the Arabic short story. He studied and practiced medicine, but his interests were in politics and the support of the nationalist struggle, and in writing--and his writing, whether in his regular newspaper columns or in his fiction, often reflected his political convictions. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize for literature more than once, and when the prize went to Naguib Mahfouz in 1988, Idris felt that he had been passed over because of his outspoken views on Israel. In all, Yusuf Idris wrote some twelve collections of superbly crafted short stories, mainly about ordinary, poor people, many of which have been translated into English and are included, along with an extract from one of his novels, in this collection of the best of his work.

The Essential Yusuf Idris

The Essential Yusuf Idris PDF Author: Yūsuf Idrīs
Publisher: American Univ in Cairo Press
ISBN: 9789774162428
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
The only fiction collection available in English translation by the Arab world's greatest short-story writer of the twentieth century Yusuf Idris (1927-91), who belonged to the same generation of pioneering Egyptian writers as Naguib Mahfouz and Tawfiq al-Hakim, is widely celebrated as the father of the Arabic short story. He studied and practiced medicine, but his interests were in politics and the support of the nationalist struggle, and in writing--and his writing, whether in his regular newspaper columns or in his fiction, often reflected his political convictions. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize for literature more than once, and when the prize went to Naguib Mahfouz in 1988, Idris felt that he had been passed over because of his outspoken views on Israel. In all, Yusuf Idris wrote some twelve collections of superbly crafted short stories, mainly about ordinary, poor people, many of which have been translated into English and are included, along with an extract from one of his novels, in this collection of the best of his work.

The Cheapest Nights, and Other Stories

The Cheapest Nights, and Other Stories PDF Author: Yūsuf Idrīs
Publisher: Three Continents
ISBN: 9780894106668
Category : Arab countries
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
One of Egypt's foremost writers, the acknowledged genius of the modern Arabic short story. Encompassing works from every stage of his career, this is the first collection of his stories to appear in English.

The Sinners

The Sinners PDF Author: Yūsuf Idrīs
Publisher: Three Continents
ISBN: 9780894103940
Category : Arabic fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description


The Essential Naguib Mahfouz

The Essential Naguib Mahfouz PDF Author: Najīb Maḥfūẓ
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9774163877
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 293

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Book Description
A carefully curated selection of the most important works of Egypt's Nobel literature laureate in a single volume Naguib Mahfouz, the first and only writer of Arabic to be awarded the Nobel prize for literature, wrote prolifically from the 1930s until shortly before his death in 2006, in a variety of genres: novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, a regular weekly newspaper column, and in later life his intensely brief and evocative Dreams. His Cairo Trilogy achieved the status of a world classic, and the Swedish Academy of Letters in awarding him the 1988 Nobel prize for literature noted that Mahfouz "through works rich in nuance--now clear-sightedly realistic, now evocatively ambiguous--has formed an Arabic narrative art that applies to all mankind." Here Denys Johnson-Davies, described by Edward Said as "the leading Arabic-English translator of our time," makes an essential selection of short stories and extracts from novels and other writings, to present a cross-section through time of the very best of the work of Egypt's Nobel literature laureate.

Modern Arabic Fiction

Modern Arabic Fiction PDF Author: Salma Khadra Jayyusi
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231132541
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 1096

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Book Description
"Jayyusi provides biographical information on the writers as well as a substantial introduction to the development of modern Arabic fictional genres that considers the central thematic and aesthetic concerns of Arab short story writers and novelists."--Jacket.

Arabic Short Stories

Arabic Short Stories PDF Author:
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520089440
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
Collects twenty-four short stories by Arabic authors such as Bahaa Taher, Alifa Rifaat, and Edward El-Kharrat, which explore such themes as prostitution, adultery, and arranged marriage.

The Polymath

The Polymath PDF Author: Bensalem Himmich
Publisher: American Univ in Cairo Press
ISBN: 9789774162527
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
This award-winning historical novel deals with the stormy life of the outstanding Arab philosopher Ibn Khaldun, using historical sources, and particularly material from the writer's works, to construct the personal and intellectual universe of a fourteenth-century genius. The dominant concern of the novel the uneasy relationship between intellectuals and political power, between scholars and authority addresses our times through the transparent veil of history. In the first part of the novel, we are introduced to the mind of Ibn Khaldun as he dictates his work to his scribe and interlocutor. The second part delves into the heart of the man and his retrieval of a measure of happiness and affection in a remarriage, after the drowning of his first wife and their children at sea. Finally we see Ibn Khaldun as a man of action, trying to minimize the imminent horrors of invading armies and averting the sack of Damascus by Tamerlane, only to spend his last years lonely and destitute, having been fired from his post as qadi, his wife having gone to Morocco, and his attempts at saving the political situation having come to nil. "The elusive simplicity and fluency of style manage to entertain and instruct at once. We learn as we read about Ibn Khaldun: his insights into history and historiography, his views of the rise and fall of civilizations, the principles of his sociological thinking, along with intimate aspects of his life, including his tragic losses and his attitude toward women. We also learn of his response to the major crisis of his time, the Tatar invasion of the Mashriq. In short, Ibn Khaldun, the distant and formidable figure, is humanized thanks to this novel." Naguib Mahfouz Medal Award Committee

The Mirage

The Mirage PDF Author: محفوظ، نجيب،
Publisher: American Univ in Cairo Press
ISBN: 9789774162657
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
A psychological study of the first order with a subtly Freudian flavor, The Mirage is the autobiographical account of Kamil Ru'ba, a tortured soul who finds himself struggling unduly to cope with life's challenges. The internal torment and angst that dog him throughout his life and the tragic, ironic turns of events that overtake him as a young man are, to a great extent, the outworkings of his faulty upbringing. At the same time, they work together to drive home the novel's underlying theme: the illusory, undependable nature of the world in which we live and the call to seek, beyond the outward and the ephemeral, that which is inward and enduring. The narrative, full of pathos, draws the reader unwittingly into a vicarious experience of Kamil's agonies and ecstasies. As such, it is a specimen of Mahfouz's prose at its finest.

The Theocrat

The Theocrat PDF Author: Bensalem Himmich
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 977416251X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 185

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Book Description
The Theocrat takes as its subject one of Arab and Islamic history's most perplexing figures, al-Hakim bi-Amr Illah ("the ruler by order of God"), the Fatimid caliph who ruled Egypt during the tenth century and whose career was a direct reflection of both the tensions within the Islamic dominions as a whole and of the conflicts within his own mind. In this remarkable novel Bensalem Himmich explores these tensions and conflicts and their disastrous consequences on an individual ruler and on his people. Himmich does not spare his readers the full horror and tragedy of al-Hakim's reign, but in employing a variety of textual styles--including quotations from some of the best known medieval Arab historians; vivid historical narratives; a series of extraordinary decrees issued by the caliph; and, most remarkably, the inspirational utterances of al-Hakim during his ecstatic visions, recorded by his devotees and subsequently a basis for the foundation of the Druze community--he succeeds brilliantly in painting a portrait of a character whose sheer unpredictability throws into relief the qualities of those who find themselves forced to cajole, confront, or oppose him.

Munira's Bottle

Munira's Bottle PDF Author: محيميد، يوسف
Publisher: American Univ in Cairo Press
ISBN: 9789774163463
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
In Riyadh, against the events of the second Gulf War and Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, we learn the story of Munira--with the gorgeous eyes--and the unspeakable tragedy she suffers as her male nemesis wreaks revenge for an insult to his character and manhood. It is also the tale of many other women of Saudi Arabia who pass through the remand center where Munira works, victims and perpetrators of crimes, characters pained and tormented, trapped in cocoons of silence and fear. Munira records their stories on pieces of paper that she folds up and places in the mysterious bottle given to her long ago by her grandmother, a repository for the stories of the dead, that they might live again. This controversial novel looks at many of the issues that characterize the lives of women in modern Saudi society, including magic and envy, honor and revenge, and the strict moral code that dictates male-female interaction. "Yousef al-Mohaimeed is a rising star in international literature. Munira's Bottle is a rich and skillfully crafted story of a dysfunctional Saudi Arabian family. One of its strengths lies in its edgy characters: Munira, a sultry, self-centered, sexually repressed woman; Ibn al-Dahhal, the bold imposter who deceives and betrays her; and Muhammad, her perpetually angry and righteous brother, a catalyst who forces the events. Western readers will welcome it for its opening door into Arab lives and minds."--Annie Proulx "Mohaimeed writes in a lush style that evokes a writer he cites as an influence, Gabriel Garcia Marquez. [He] takes on some of the most divisive subjects in the Arab world."--Washington Post