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Children of the Waters » (1st Edition)

Book cover image of Children of the Waters by Ibtihal Salem

Authors: Ibtihal Salem, Ibtihal Salim, Marilyn Booth
ISBN-13: 9780292777736, ISBN-10: 0292777736
Format: Paperback
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Date Published: January 2003
Edition: 1st Edition

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Author Biography: Ibtihal Salem

MARILYN BOOTH is an independent scholar and freelance literary translator whose research and writing focus on gender and writing in Egypt, popular culture, and human rights. She lives in Columbus, Ohio.

Book Synopsis

Ibtihal Salem's writing provides an excellent forum for studying both everyday life in Egypt and current literary experimentation in the Middle East. Her poignant pieces hover between the structure of story-telling, the visuality of vignettes, and the compression of poetry. They both record and evoke a literary ferment going on in Egypt today.
Salem's writing of the last thirty years is lauded for its social messages also. Finding the expression of sexuality necessary to explicate problems of Egyptian identity, Salem often links poverty to gender marginality. Her heroines, however, celebrate the heritages that have shaped them, even as they resist certain aspects of them. Like many writers in Egypt, Salem honors traditional folktales, even as she deals with contemporary problems from class and economic perspectives.
Marilyn Booth, one of the best translators of Arabic fiction working today, has dealt in her introduction to this collection with the unusual experimental form by examining Salem's craft as well as the contextual history surrounding the stories. Since Salem is writing "across genres," Booth helps the reader also by opening each piece with an explanatory comment, often quoting the author, and thus further illuminating Salem's portrayals of lives bounded by Egypt's waters--the Canal, the Nile, and the Mediterranean.

Table of Contents

Introduction3
Arabi13
Anticipation21
Behind Closed Doors23
Making Bets27
February33
The Work Gang37
Palm Trees and the Sea41
Shadow Puppets45
Tea Grown Cold49
A Toast to the Full Moon51
Cusp55
Bags of Candy57
Rage61
My Friend "Patriot"63
Little Things Don't Lie67
Crumbs69
An Empty Tin Can71
The Shape of Prison75
The Handsomest Portrait She Had Ever Seen77
Rape81
Everyday Duty83
Threads of Thought85
Open Wound89
Songs from the Tree's Core91
Pangs95
Fire97
Kite Full of Color99
Lost Harbor103
Song of the Wounded Heart105
Glass Barricades109
Nothing at All111
Bitter Mirth113
Short-lived Moments115
Passage117
The Boot121

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