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Abdellah Taïa's Novel ''The Day of the King''
The Bitter Taste of Injustice
In his most recent novel, Le jour du Roi (The Day of the King), which has just been published in German translation, the Moroccan author Abdellah Taïa once again takes the reader back to the "leaden years", Morocco's dark days under the former ruler Hassan II. Claudia Kramatschek sends us this review
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Interview with Etel Adnan
''I React to What is Happening in the World''
Etel Adnan, the grand dame of Middle Eastern literature, is the epitome of cosmopolitanism: throughout her life, she has oscillated between one country, one language, and one genre and another. dOCUMENTA (13) dedicated an entire retrospective to this exceptional poet, writer, and painter. Vera Kern travelled to Kassel to meet the 87-year-old
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Elias Khoury's Novel ''Yalo''
The Word and the War
More than twenty years after the end of Lebanon's civil war, the conflicting parties can still not agree on a single narrative of events. With "Yalo", Elias Khoury has written a magnificent novel on the Lebanese struggles for history. By Sonja Hegasy
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Mansoura ez-Eldin's ''Beyond Paradise''
Dark Family Secrets on the Nile
A book by the Egyptian writer Mansoura ez-Eldin has been published in German for the first time. In it, the novelist relates a family saga set in the landscape of the Nile Delta. But as a work that first appeared in pre-revolutionary 2009, does it have any relevance now? Axel von Ernst finds out
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The Cultural Scene in Iraq
Returning to Something Like Normality
In the wake of the long years of terror, a vibrant cultural scene is once more flourishing in Iraq. But people still have come to terms with the fact that culture in the 'New Iraq' is becoming more and more privatised. Birgit Svensson reports from Baghdad
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Interview with the Saudi-Arabian Writer Raja Alem
Elegy for a Lost Era
The Saudi-Arabian writer Raja Alem is regarded as one of the leading voices in Arabic literature. Her new novel, "The Necklace of the Dove", which shows the dark side of modern Mecca, was awarded the Arab Booker Prize. An interview by Irmgard Berner
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Obituary for Fuad Rifka
The Advocate of Lyrical Attentiveness
The renowned Lebanese poet Fuad Rifka died last Saturday at the age of 80. Alongside Adonis and Mahmud Darwish he was one of the great revivers of Arabic poetry, yet among those of his own generation he remained unique until the end. An obituary by Stefan Weidner
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Rethinking World Literature
The Arabic Novel in Non-Western Eyes
Anthologies of "world literature" have often used the term to market a largely Western canon. But isn't western literature still implicitly regarded as the measure of all things? And are we not overlooking other literary values out of sheer ignorance? By Fakhri Saleh
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Arabic in Latin Script
Lost in Arabic
Arabic was never easy. But if the language spoken by some 240 million people with its convoluted verb forms and guttural phonology suddenly starts appearing in Latin script, then things get really complicated. And at the same time very straightforward. Details from Mona Sarkis
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Interview with Hans Magnus Enzensberger
"Europe Has No Copyright on the Enlightenment"
At the invitation of Sheikh Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai, a number of eminent German and Arab intellectuals recently met for a "cultural dialogue". Hans Magnus Enzensberger was among their number, addressing in his speech the question of whether the Arab world needs a new Enlightenment. Loay Mudhoon spoke to the author