Arabic Booker (Almost) Announced...

And if the Abu Dhabi book fair's coming up, then so is the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, aka the "Arabic Booker," which will shower its bounty - including English translation paid for by Sigrid Rausing, owner of Granta - at the fest. Both The National and the LA Times are spinning the award's potential for controversy: the LA Times focuses on the religious taboos broken by Ibrahim Nasrallah and by Yousuf Zeydan's Beelzebub. Ed Lake at the National picks up on two books that are about the vexed role of the translator/interpreter, suggesting that:

It would be interesting to see Fawaz Haddad’s entry, The Unfaithful Translator, take the prize, if only to see what the Granta people make of it. The Syrian author tells the tale of an interpreter whose unconventional views on the role of free translation in creativity and culture see him condemned for betrayal.

He also picks up on:

the one woman on the list, Inaam Kachachi, [who] presents what may be the timeliest offering. The American Granddaughter shows the ravages of modern Iraq through the eyes of an American-Iraqi woman. She returns to her home country in the compromised role of US Army interpreter; how else could that old feminist saw “the personal is political” be made to pack a more dramatic punch?

More from Dubai: Is Censorship an Elephant?

That's Claire Armistead's opinion, writing in the Guardian (which, hmm, generated this whole debate in the first place when it hosted Geraldine Bedell's blog without checking the facts) on Monday. She attended the "hastily arranged censorship debate" convened by the festival. Speakers included Margaret Atwood (via videolink), Ibrahim Nasrallah, Andrei Kurkov, Rachel Billington, PEN secretary Eugene Schoulgin, Rajaa al-Sanea and festival host Mohammed al-Murr.

What appears to have emerged from the debate is that censorship operates on a spectrum across all nations, including those that pride themselves on their openness and multiculturalism, such as Canada, but it carries greater attendant risks - imprisonment, torture, exile - in some countries than others. Andrei Kurkov, from the Ukraine, also alluded to the commercial potential of a whiff of censorship, criticising publishers for seeking out censorship as a "badge."

Perhaps most of interest -- and it's unclear how or whether this relates to the media spotlight on the emirates created by Bedell's blog, or to the presence of the international festival -- is something Armistead reports towards the beginning of her article. After the case of three journalists who were jailed for defamation over something they had written on the internet

Shaikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, the emir of Dubai who is also its vice-president and prime minister, has since decreed that no journalist should receive a prison sentence for press-related offences, and the journalists have all been released from jail.

2009 International Prize for Arabic Fiction announced

Thanks to Three Percent for the tip-off about this prize. And the longlist:

16 books (not widely available in UAE bookstores, according to The Nation) were chosen from 121 eligible entries.

Of these, only two of the authors (ibrahims Al-Koni and Nasrallah) have had book-length works translated into English. Several others - Ali Bader, Inaam Kachachi, Rabih Jaber, Habib Selmi - have had stories, excerpts and poems translated into English in Banipal magazine (back issues available). Bookbrunch (who also helpfully lists the Arabic publishers of all the titles) notes that

the 2008 winner, Sunset Oasis by Bahaa Taher, is being translated into English (with funding by Sigrid Rausing) by Humphrey Davies, and will be published by Sceptre in summer 2009.

The Bottle and the Genie, Mohammad Abu Maatouk
The Tobacco Guard, Ali Badr (review here)
Hunger, Mohammad Al Bsati
The Unfaithful Translator, Fawaz Haddad
The Man From Andalucia, Salem Hameesh
Prayer For The Family, Renée Hayek
Confessions, Rabih Jaber
Platoon Of Ruin, Abdel Kareem Jouaitly
The American Granddaughter, Inaam Kachachi
The Tumour, Ibrahim Al Koni
Black Taste, Black Odour, Ali Al Muqri
Time Of White Horses, Ibrahim Nasrallah
The Scents Of Marie-Claire, Al Habib Salmi
Intensive Care, Izzedin Shukri
Ma’ Al Sama’, Yehya Yekhlef
Beelzebub, Yussef Zeydan

The winner will be announced at the Abu Dhabi Book Fair on March 6, 2009.