Literary Panel Discussion

Various generations of Arab authors have employed the novel to depict important historical events or epochs in the region. More and more, Arab authors are writing out of an urge to unveil prohibited experiences and in doing so are defying social taboos and political considerations. In this conversation, some of the Arab world's noted novelists will address the challenges and opportunities of addressing current political and social concerns. Event Timing: 90 minutes
 
Panel Moderator
Khaled Mattawa (Libya/USA) is Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan, Master of Fine Arts Creative Writing Program, and is the author of three books of poetry, Amorisco (2008), Zodiac of Echoes (2003), and Ismailia Eclipse (1999). He has translated seven volumes of Arabic poetry by Iman Mersal, Joumana, Haddad, Maram al-Massri, Fadhil al-Azzawi, Saadi Youssef, and Hatif Janabi, and co-edited two anthologies of Arab American literature. Mattawa has been awarded the PEN award for literary translation, a Guggenheim fellowship, the Alfred Hodder fellowship from Princeton University, an NEA translation grant, and two Pushcart prizes. His poems have appeared in Poetry, The Kenyon Review, Antioch Review, Best American Poetry, and many other journals. Mattawa was born in Libya and came to the United States in his teens. He is the current President of the Radius of Arab American Writers, Inc. (RAWI).
 
Panel Speakers
Adania Shibli (Palestine) was awarded the Young Writer's Award-Palestine by the A.M. Qattan Foundation for her novel Masaas ("Touching," 2002) and Kulluna Ba'eed Bethat al Miqdar ‘an al Hub ("We Are All Equally Far From Love," 2004). She is currently completing her Ph.D. in media and cultural studies at the University of East London, and is a lecturer at the University of Nottingham in the School of Critical Theory and Cultural Studies.
 
Radwa Ashour (Egypt) is a writer and academic who has published seven novels, an autobiographical work, two collections of short stories, and four books of literary criticism. Part I of her Granada Trilogy won the Cairo International Book Fair 1994 Book of the Year Award; the Trilogy won First Prize at the first Arab Woman's Book Fair (Cairo, 1995). Ashour was also awarded the 2007 Constantine Cavafy Prize for Literature.
 
Ahmed El-Fagih (Libya) is a writer whose work includes the award-winning trilogy Gardens of the Night and a large body of novels, plays, short story collections, and essays. El-Fagih was a leading figure on the Arab cultural scene in London in the 1970s and 1980s. He also founded and chaired many institutions in Libya and abroad and served as Libya's Ambassador to Greece and Romania. 

Part of ARABESQUE: Arts of the Arab World

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