{"id":13688,"date":"2015-09-15T09:56:11","date_gmt":"2015-09-15T13:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/?p=13688"},"modified":"2015-09-15T09:56:11","modified_gmt":"2015-09-15T13:56:11","slug":"listening-to-refugees-5-novels-stories-and-essays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/listening-to-refugees-5-novels-stories-and-essays\/","title":{"rendered":"Listening to Refugees: 5 Novels, Stories, and\u00a0Essays"},"content":{"rendered":"

via the very excellent Arab Literature (in English)<\/strong><\/em>:<\/span><\/p>\n

BY MLYNXQUALEY<\/a><\/span><\/span> on<\/em> 2<\/a> )<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Abo Adnan, a Syrian who\u00a0lives in a refugee camp in Germany, asks that we not just look at refugees, but listen<\/a>. Refugee literary voices:<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Sculpture<\/a><\/p>\n

African Titanics,\u00a0<\/em>by\u00a0Abu Bakr Khaal<\/a>. <\/strong>Khaal is a refugee who left Eritrea for Denmark. His novel follows\u00a0his characters<\/a> \u201cthrough the Sahara Desert, to cramped refugee hideaways, to prisons and ghettos, out onto the frightening leaky ships of the Mediterranean\u2014these are great, fast-moving Odyssean adventures.\u201d These are the songs of refugees\u00a0from all across the region, most of whom sink in one way or another. Translated by Charis Bredon.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Truck to Berlin,\u201d by Hassan Blasim.<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>Blasim is an Iraqi refugee who found his way to Finland. From the collection\u00a0Madman of Freedom Square<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em>This terrifying story tells of a truck full of refugees\u00a0rushing\u00a0through a Serbian forest, pursued by the border police. Translated by Jonathan Wright.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Refugee Crisis,\u201d by Samar Yazbek.<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>Yazbek is a Syrian refugee currently living in France. The\u00a0Guardian\u00a0<\/em>had a number of writers respond to the trigger of \u201crefugee crisis\u201d; Yazbek, a novelist and journalist, reminds us that we must see it in its context. \u201cYes, we need to find a solution to the refugee crisis, but let\u2019s start by talking transparently and impartially about the underlying causes of this catastrophe that sees no end.\u201d Translated by Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp.<\/p>\n

\u201cSea of Refuge,\u201d by Hanan al-Shaykh<\/a>. <\/i><\/a><\/strong>During the Lebanese civil war, al-Shaykh fled to London.\u00a0Granta\u00a0<\/em>also asked writers to respond to the idea of refuge and refugees.<\/p>\n

Men in the Sun,\u00a0<\/i>by Ghassan Kanafani<\/a>. <\/strong>Kanafani was a Palestinian writer who lived, and was assassinated in, Lebanon. The novella\u00a0<\/strong>Men in the Sun<\/em>\u00a0follows\u00a0three Palestinians fleeing\u00a0Lebanon\u2019s refugee camps for\u00a0Iraq\u00a0with the goal of reaching\u00a0Kuwait. They are smuggled across the desert in the empty barrel of a water tanker truck.\u00a0Translated by\u00a0Hilary Kilpatrick.<\/p>\n

More recent\u00a0Syrian works:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Syria Speaks: Art and Culture from the Front Line<\/a>;\u00a0<\/em>ed.\u00a0Malu Halasa,\u00a0<\/strong>Zaher Omareen, and Nawara Mahfoud;<\/p>\n

The Crossing,\u00a0<\/em>by Samar Yazbek<\/a>,\u00a0trans. by Nashwa Gowanlock and Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp;<\/p>\n

Woman in the Crossfire,\u00a0<\/a><\/em>by Yazbek<\/a>, trans. Max Weiss;<\/p>\n

Short stories by Rasha Abbas, from The Gist of It,\u00a0<\/em><\/a>trans. Alice Guthrie;<\/p>\n

\u201cMy Fingers Are Not Enough,\u201d <\/a>by Derar Soltan Kurdieh,\u00a0<\/em>trans. Fawaz Azem;<\/p>\n

Three other Syrian poems<\/a>, trans. Azem;<\/p>\n

And fourteen Poems from Loneliness Spoils its Victims<\/em>, by\u00a0Dara Abdallah<\/a>, trans. Mona Kareem.<\/p>\n

For instructors:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Teaching Syrian Stories: Between Understanding and Empathy\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

via the very excellent Arab Literature (in English): BY MLYNXQUALEY on SEPTEMBER 15, 2015 \u2022 ( 2 ) Abo Adnan, a Syrian who\u00a0lives in a refugee camp in Germany, asks that we not just...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,12,103],"tags":[1775,1754],"class_list":["post-13688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arab-culture","category-arabic","category-translation","tag-refugees","tag-syria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13688"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13690,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13688\/revisions\/13690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}