Banipal (UK) Magazine of Modern Arab Literature

Announcement on COVID-19

Although the UK lockdown has been lessened slightly from 1 June, we are continuing to work from home. Meanwhile, all orders for the print editions of our books and for Banipal magazine are being received as usual. Our distributor NBNi is open, working safely, and despatching all orders on our behalf. For books within the UK, we expect delivery to be within a week, while for orders outside the UK we expect it to be between 2 to 4 weeks. We are checking regularly with Royal Mail for any restrictions on mailing.

Stay safe and well. Stay home.

Mansi A Rare Man in His Own Way

by Tayeb Salih
ISBN: 978-0-9956369-8-9

Paperback • eBook • 184pp

"A flavourful and entertaining memoir of his friendship with a shape-shifting, rule-breaking character" – Boyd Tonkin

The Mariner

by Taleb Alrefai
ISBN: 978-0-9956369-8-9

Paperback • eBook • 160pp
Both formats available now

Taleb Alrefai turns a spotlight on Kuwait’s pearl-fishing history in this enthralling fictional re-telling of the day the country’s famous shipmaster Captain Al-Najdi was lost at sea.

Goat Mountain

by Habib Selmi
ISBN: 978-1-913043-04-9

Paperback • eBook • 92pp
Both formats available now

"This intense, glacial fantasy is the work of a literary master. At a subliminal level, it can be read as the intellectual’s despairing and suicidal attack on inhuman political power" – James Kirkup

A Boat to Lesbos

by Nouri Al-Jarrah
ISBN: 978-0-9956369-4-1

Paperback • 120pp • £9.99
Illustrated with 20 paintings by Reem Yassouf
First collection in English translation for Syrian poet Nouri Al-Jarrah. Translated from the Arabic by Camilo Gómez-Rivas and Allison Blecker.

An Iraqi In Paris

by Samuel Shimon
ISBN: 9780957442481

Paperback • 282pp • £9.99

A fully revised third edition in translation of this best-selling ‘gem of autobiographical writing’ in the Arab world, by an author who has been called ‘a relentless raconteur’, ‘a modern Odysseus’, ‘the Iraqi Don Quixote’.

Knife Sharpener

by Sargon Boulus
ISBN: 978-0-9549666-7-6

Paperback • 154pp • £7.99 • $15

These Selected Poems, translated from the Arabic by Sargon Boulus himself before his untimely passing, are a commemoration and celebration of him and his influential work.

Heavenly Life

by Ramsey Nasr
ISBN: 978-0-9549666-9-0

180pp • £7.99 • €12 • $15
Selected Poems

First English-language collection for Ramsey Nasr, the Palestinian-Dutch Poet Laureate of the Netherlands.

Translated from the Dutch by David Colmer. Introduction by Victor Schiferli and Foreword by Ruth Padel

“With this collection Anglophone readers are introduced to a poet of global scope," writes renowned American poet Marilyn Hacker

Shepherd of Solitude

by Amjad Nasser
ISBN: 978-0-9549666-8-3

186pp • £7.95 • $15

Selected Poems

Translated from the Arabic by Khaled Mattawa

Shepherd of Solitude is the first English collection for Jordanian poet Amjad Nasser, translated and introduced by the foremost translator of contemporary Arabic poetry into English Khaled Mattawa, with the poems selected by poet and translator from the poet's Arabic volumes over the years 1979 to 2004.

Mordechai's Moustache and his Wife's Cats, and other stories

by Mahmoud Shukair
ISBN: 978-0-9549666-3-8

Paperback • 124 pages • £7.99

Here is the brilliantly observed clutter and comedy of everyday lives, the lives of ordinary people pushed up against an iron occupation and fighting for survival . . .

• To read the title story Mordechai's Moustache and his Wife's Cats, online, click here.

A Retired Gentleman, and other stories

by Issa J Boullata
ISBN: 978-0-9549666-6-9

Paperback • 120 pages • £7.99 • $15
From Palestine, Lebanon, Egypt and Syria. George, Kamal, Mayy, Abdullah, Nadia, William, all have to begin their lives again, learn how to deal with their memories, with their pasts . . .

Unbuttoning the Violin

by Mansoura Ez-Eldin, Joumana Haddad, Ala Hlehel, Abed Ismael
ISBN: 0-9549666-2-7

Paperback • 128pp • £3.95

Poems and short stories by four young Arab authors celebrating their tour of the UK August 2006 with Banipal Live, a partnership of Banipal magazine with the British Council and The Reading Agency.