PUBLISHER / EDITOR Margaret Obank ASSISTANT EDITOR Samuel Shimon COVER ARTIST Dima Hajjar CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Khaled Mattawa Saadi Youssef Anton Shammas Peter Clark Fadhil al-Azzawi Sinan Antoon Paul Starkey Issa J Boullata Mona Zaki CONSULTING EDITORS Naguib Mahfouz Etel Adnan Roger Allen Mohammed Bennis Gamal el-Ghitani Marilyn Hacker Erdmute Heller Herbert Mason Yasir Suleiman Susannah Tarbush Sargon Boulus Saif al-Rahbi COPY EDITING D Horton, E Kilroy LAYOUT Banipal Publishing

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Tel: +44 (0)20 8568 9747 Fax: +44 (0)20 8568 8509 editorial email: editor@banipal.co.uk subscriptions: subscribe@banipal.co.uk website: www.banipal.co.uk PRINTED BY Short Run Press Ltd Bittern Road, Sowton Ind. Est. EXETER EX2 7LW ISSN: 1461-5363 Photographs not accredited have been donated, photographers unknown © All material: Banipal, authors, translators and artists. All rights reserved.

Banipal takes its name from Ashurbanipal, last great king of Assyria and patron of the arts, whose outstanding achievement was to assemble in Nineveh, from all over his empire, the first systematically organised library in the ancient Middle East. The thousands of clay tablets of Sumerian, Babylonian and Assyrian writings included the famous Mesopotamian epics of the Creation, the Flood, and Gilgamesh, many folk tales, fables, proverbs, prayers and omen texts. Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica

CONTENTS No 23, Summer 2005

2 EDITORIAL 3 Ala’ Hlehel A short story My Husband is a Bus Driver 010 Mahmoud Darwish A Poem Not Like a Foreign Tourist Would

13 Duna Ghali A short story Sip 016 FEATURE ON OMANI POET SAIF AL-RAHBI

Poems translated by Anton Shammas, plus Introduction by Fadhil al-Azzawi Interview by Abdulla al-Harrasi, and profiles by Fakhri Saleh, Eskandar Habache and Khalid al-Maaly 40 Abdellatif Laâbi Excerpt from Le Fond de la Jarre 49 Abdelwahab Meddeb Five Poems 58 Joumana Haddad Article The Forty Thieves of Fire and Me 66 Hamid al-Iqabi A short story The Banjo Player 69 Mowaffk al-Sawad Three Poems 72 FEATURE ON SYRIAN POET SANIYA SALIH (1939-1995)

Poems translated by Issa J Boullata, plus Introduction by Abed Ismael and profile by Abdo Wazen LITERARY INFLUENCES 88 Fadhil al-Azzawi I Lived a Magical Feast

98 Thani al-Suweidi Six Poems 100 Jad el-Hage A chapter from the novel The Myrtle Bush 106 Suleman Taufiq Fourteen Poems 110 Abu-Youssef Taha A short story Black Lilies 114 Abed Ismael Three Poems 118 Nadiah Alkokabany Fireworks to Celebrate a Deflowering 122 Haggag Hassan Oddoul A short story Nights of Musk 130 INTERVIEW with Peter Ripken, editor Literatur Nachrichten A TRAVELLING TALE 134 Samuel Shimon Steppenwolf Goes to San Francisco 143 TRIBUTE to Hisham Sharabi (1927–2005) BOOK REVIEWS 144 Peter Clark Modern Arasbic Literature in Translation by Salih Altoma and Lexicon Arabischer Autoren by al-Maaly & Nagger

146 Margaret Obank Anubis by Ibrahim al-Kony 148 Eleanor Kilroy Tomorrow is Another Day by Khalid Kishtainy EVENTS 149 London: Caine Prize for African Writing 150 London: Edwar al-Kharrat and Selim Matar 151 Paris: Assia Djebar: Algerian joins Académie française 152 Rabat: Moroccan–German Dialogue in Poetry 154 Rotterdam: Emad Fouad at Poetry International Festival 156 CONTRIBUTORS ANDTRANSLATORS

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