Banipal 2008

Past Events

5 to 9 May 2008 3.30pm BBC Radio 4 FIVE SHORT STORIES FROM NORTH AFRICA published in translation in BANIPAL MAGAZINE with some republished in the collection SARDINES AND ORANGES, published by Banipal Books were broadcast, in the English translation, one a day, as below, from Monday to Friday, 5 to 9 May Produced by Square Dog Productions for Radio 4. [read more]

Tue 11 Mar 2008 6.00 to 7.30pm Manchester Central Library Banipal magazine is the winner of the 2008 Incwriters Outstanding Contribution to Literature (Magazines) award. It was chosen from the short list of ten magazines below and the award presented at a ceremony at Manchester Central Library. [read more]

Mon 10 Mar 2008 7pm Abu Dhabi At a splendid award ceremony in Abu Dhabi on 10 March 2008, the chair of judges of the new International Prize for Arabic Fiction, known as the Arab Booker, announced that the inaugural winner of the £50,000 prize was Egyptian author Bahaa Taher for his novel *Wahat al-Ghurub [Sunset Oasis]*. [read more]

Thu 25 Oct 2007 6.30pm to 9pm IDEA STORE, WHITECHAPEL, London E1 SMALL AND INDEPENDENT 11 Learn more about small press publishing at this talk, Q&A and networking event Four publishers and editors share their experience of setting up a small press and give advice to guide you on your way through the process. Panellists are Shaun Levin, Nii Ayikwei Parkes, Margaret Obank, and Chris Hamilton-Emery Organised by Spread the Word, London's agency for supporting the development of new creative writing and live literature events Small Press Fair: 6.30pm – 9pm Panel discussion followed by Q&A: 7pm – 8.15pm Drinks reception: 8.30pm – 9pm at the Idea Store Whitechapel Nearest tube: Whitechapel For a map, click here [read more]

10-14 OCTOBER 2007 All day each day FRANKFURT BOOK FAIR The world’s largest fair for the book trade was attended by even more visitors than last year, over 280,000. Hall 5, home of Frankfurt Book Fair’s International Centre was a veritable hub, housing the Guest of Honour Pavilion for Catalan Culture, as well publishers from the Arab world, South American and African countries, Iran, Turkey, Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Armenia, and many others; also booths for small independent literary publishers, such as Banipal, Dar al-Jamal, and Hans Schiler Verlag. [read more]

Sat 6 Oct 2007 11am to 7pm The Lowry, Salford Manchester Festival of Literature’s Independents' Day was a day of activities for independent small publishers,mostly local magazine and poetry publishers. Banipal's stand exhibited and sold magazines and books, including the two new collections of short stories, Mordechai's Moustache and his Wife's Cats and A Retired Gentleman. [read more]

Mon 9 Jul 2007 6.30pm for 7pm Institut Fran�ais, 17 Queensberry Place, London Banipal magazine & the Institut Français host special reception and poetry reading to welcome poets from Lebanon Abdo Wazen, Zeinab Assaf and Bassam Hajjar after their performance at the Ledbury Poetry Festival [read more]

Sat 7 Jul 2007 2.30pm Burgage Hall, Ledbury Poetry Festival FROM LEBANON TO LEDBURY Lebanese poets visited the UK for this exclusive event at the Ledbury Poetry Festival. Two of the poets had never read in the UK before and one is newly translated into English. [read more]

Wed 23 May 2007 7pm Poets House, 72 Spring St, 2nd floor, New York An invitation to celebrate today’s poets from Lebanon [read more]

Fri 4 May 2007 7.00pm Virgin Megastore Bookshop, Beirut Centre Ville, Beirut Lebanese author Jad El Hage launches his second novel written in English The Myrtle Tree (Banipal Books) in Beirut. [read more]

Sat 28 Apr 2007 9.30am Amman, Jordan The 2nd International Translation Conference of the Arab Thought Foundation was held in Amman, 27 and 28 April 2007. An important panel was organised by the Next Page Foundation, which looked at the experience of promoting Arab literature outside the Arab world, and that means, in translation. [read more]

Tue 17 Apr 2007 7pm for 7.30pm Daunt Books, 112-114 Holland Park Avenue, London W11 4UA A great crowd of friends, journalists, critics, literary agents, publishers and authors, among them Hanan al-Shaykh, Hisham Matar, Aamer Hussein and Amjad Nasser, gathered at Daunt Books for the London launch of The Myrtle Tree. [read more]

Tue 17 Apr 2007 12 noon London Book Fair, Central Books Stand Author of The Myrtle Tree Jad El Hage joined the throng of visitors and exhibitors at The London Book Fair's new venue at Earl's Court, just a stone's throw from where he used to live when he was in London. [read more]

Sun 1 Apr 2007 All day 17th ABU DHABI INTERNATIONAL BOOK FAIR THIS year’s book fair, was organised for the first time in co-operation with the Frankfurt Book Fair and housed in a dedicated ultra-modern exhibition centre. The week-long fair was open every day to the public with free admission; schools took it in turns to attend en masse, from kindergarten to secondary school and university. [read more]

Tue 30 Jan 2007 6pm Northcote Town Hall, Northcote, Melbourne, Australia Australians for Lebanon launched The Myrtle Tree by Lebanese Australian Jad El Hage, who was introduced by Joe Camilleri, Professor of International Relations, La Trobe University Organised with the support of Darebin and Australian and Lebanese Historical Society [read more]

Thu 11 Jan 2007 7pm Afaq Bookshop, Qasr Al-Aini Street, Cairo Afaq Bookshop, Qasr Al-Aini Street, Cairo Samuel Shimon read from his autobiographical novel Iraqi fi Baris . . . AN IRAQ'S NEVER-ENDING DREAM is reported by Ahmed Maged in the Beirut Daily Star . . . [read more]

Wed 22 Mar 2006 6.30pm THE IRISH CENTRE, HAMMERSMITH, LONDON W6 At the Hammersmith & Fulham WORDwide Festival, Banipal hosts an evening with three Arab authors who live and write in London. [read more]

August 2005 all month ASSILAH, Morocco Assilah, this small village on the Atlantic, has been host to a major month-long cultural festival since 1978. [read more]

December 2005 and February 2006 Daytime and evening Berlin, Germany Contemporary Arab Representations: The Iraqi Equation was a multi-media cultural project curated and arranged by Catherine David in Berlin’s KW Institute for Contemporary Art in December 2005 and February 2006. [read more]

29 October-13 November 2004 BANIPAL LIVE TOUR London, Newcastle, Manchester, Lancaster, Edinburgh, Tyne & Wear, Southwold The tour brings together four renowned poets and fiction writers from Iraq, Palestine and Lebanon connecting and engaging audiences in the rich and vibrant cultures of these three areas, mainly known in the UK as scenes of war. [read more]