Banipal Magazine of Modern Arab Literature
4 primary works
Book 47
Banipal 47 - Fiction from Kuwait
by Bothayna Al-Essa, Ismail Fahd Ismail, and Taleb Alrefai
For Summer reading
Banipal 47 – Fiction from Kuwait
Fiction from Kuwait presents a selection of contemporary literature from the novels and short stories of 17 Kuwaiti authors. It spans the generations of literary voices, from the 1960s and the writings of Sulaiman al-Shatti, Ismail Fahd Ismail and Suleiman al-Khalifi, to works by Fatima Yousif al-Ali, Laila al-Othman, Waleed al-Rajeeb, Taleb Alrefai, Thuraya al-Baqsami and Fawziya Shuwaish al-Salem, and then to those of young authors Bothayna al-Essa, Saud al-Sanousi, Yousef Khalifa, Basima al-Enezi, Ali Hussain al-Felkawi, Hameady Hamood and Mona al-Shammari.
Almost the entire issue is devoted to the fiction literary scene in Kuwait today – with background articles on the development of both the short story and the novel. It is a vibrant scene, with many of the authors creating narratives of continuous and diverse dialogues on many levels – person to person, person to place, person to memory, memory to place. They discuss issues of expectation and surprise, loss and denial, love and marriage, humour, satire and melancholy, family traditions and relations, social mores and taboos, different cultures, environments, generations and geographies.
Among the book reviews in Banipal 47 are reviews of works by two winners of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction: Saudi Arabian author Abdo Khal's winning novel Throwing Sparks, and The Mehlis Report by Lebanese novelist Rabee Jaber (his winning novel The Druze of Belgrade has yet to be translated).
Photo-reports of literary achievements complete the issue – the Sheikh Zayed Book Awards, the Abu Dhabi and Casablanca International Book Fairs, the 2013 International Prize for Arabic Fiction award ceremony, and the Shubbak Festival of Contemporary Arab Culture in London.
Book 65
The Beautiful Creatures of Fadhil Al-Azzawi
by Fadhil Al-Azzawi, Bothayna Al-Essa, and Ahmad al-Qarmalawi
Book 67
Elias Khoury, The Novelist
by Elias Khoury, Muhammad Khudayyir, and Muhsin Al-Musawi
Banipal 67 – Elias Khoury, The Novelist presents a major feature on the celebrated Lebanese and international author, with excerpts from his latest novel Stella Maris, the second in the Children of the Ghetto trilogy, and a chapter from his first novel (until now not translated), plus in-depth articles on the corpus of novels including translations of his works into Hebrew, and reviews of his early novels.
• We bid Adieu to poet Amjad Nasser in Fakhri Saleh’s essay on his poetry collections.
• We introduce two winners of the Moroccan Argana International Poetry Prize – Wadih Saadeh and Hawad.
• Also featured are the six shortlisted novels of the 2020 International Prize for Arabic Fiction.
• Plus works by two well-known Iraqi writers: Muhammad Khudayyir and Muhsin al-Musawi – and poems by three young poets from Lebanon, Palestine and Tunisia.
MANY THANKS to all our contributors, authors, translators, and editors, who have been working from home under coronavirus restrictions.
Book 68
Banipal – Short Stories
by Shekha Helawy, Muhammad Khudayyir, and Bothayna Al-Essa
Covid-19 is still with us, spreading its deathly virus, killing thousands, keeping us in our homes, making us keep our distance wherever we go, wearing masks whenever we might get within a metre or so of another person, and creating virtual, digital events. Over the months it has changed the world, and till now it’s hard to see an end to it. All our lives are being transformed by it.
On 8 April, the Sheikh Zayed Book Award announced its 2020 winners – Banipal Magazine won the Publishing and Technology award. What a huge honour and accolade for this 23-year-old literary magazine. It is a tremendous boost to our very necessary translation project. We were pleased, also, to hear a mention of our new project of a second magazine – Revista Banipal for modern Arab literature in Spanish translation.
Banipal 68 – Short Stories introduces 21 diverse, engaging and thoughtful stories, mostly for the first time in English. First, from the award ceremony of the Almultaqa Prize for the Arabic Short Story, there is winner Sheikha Helawy and finalists Sofiene Rajab, Sherif Saleh and Mahmoud Al-Rahbi, and then three further great short story writers, Muhammad Khudayyir , Mustafa Taj Aldeen Almosa and Mohammed Al-Sharekh.
- Plus chapters from two novels – Free Fall by Abeer Esber and A Small Death by Mohammed Hasan Alwan.
- Plus works by two major poets – Moncef Ouhaibi, winner of the 2020 Sheikh Zayed Award for Literature, and Abdo Wazen.
- Plus interview with Mohamed Berrada and essay by Bothayna al-Essa on her writings.
- And letters from Ghassan Kanafani to Denys Johnson-Davies.
A HUGE THANKS to all our contributors who have continued working from home under coronavirus restrictions, and to our socially-distancing printer and distributor.