Books by Trevor LeGassick and Salma Khadra Jayyusi (translators)
“It frequently appears in lists of the ’10 best Arabic novels.’…The plot centers around a guy called Saeed, a hapless, naïve, Forest Gump-esque character who lives through several momentous events in Palestinian history. He is the kind of person that things always seem to happen to, but who never appears to be in control. It starts, more or less, with the events of 1948, which is the creation of the state of Israel and the expulsion of a large number of Palestinians. Saeed himself is expelled from his home, but through a series of connections (and quite a lot of luck), he manages to find his way back into the country. It’s divided into 44 little segments, all of which are comic vignettes about Saeed and his life. It is very picaresque.” Read more...
The Best 20th-Century Arab Novels
Raphael Cormack, Literary Scholar
Interviews where books by Trevor LeGassick and Salma Khadra Jayyusi (translators) were recommended
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1
The Book of Khalid
by Ameen Rihani -
2
The Open Door
by Latifa al-Zayyat & Marilyn Booth (translator) -
3
Season of Migration to the North
by Tayeb Salih and Denys Johnson-Davies (translator) -
4
The Secret Life of Saeed the Pessoptimist
by Emile Habiby & Trevor LeGassick and Salma Khadra Jayyusi (translators) -
5
Wild Thorns
by Sahar Khalifeh & Trevor Le Gassick and Elizabeth Fernea (translators)
The Best 20th-Century Arab Novels, recommended by Raphael Cormack
The Best 20th-Century Arab Novels, recommended by Raphael Cormack
Whether it’s a tragic novel set in post-indepedence Sudan or picaresque stories about a Palestinian living in Israel after 1948, many of the key Arab novels of the 20th century are available in English. Raphael Cormack, a professor of Arabic studies at Durham University, talks us through five novels from a variety of countries that explore different themes and trends in the evolution of the novel in the Arabic-speaking world.
