Absinthe: World Literature in Translation is a literary magazine that emphasizes publishing works previously untranslated to English. We publish fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction. Owned and operated by the Department of Comparative Literature at the University of Michigan, Absinthe is edited by graduate students, as well as by occasional guest editors.
Purchase our most recent issue, “Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration,” here.
Absinthe 28: Orphaned of Light features contemporary literature of migration translated from and to Arabic. In short stories, creative nonfiction essays, poetry, and selections from novels, a multiplicity of migration experiences is brought to the fore: life in diaspora, undocumented labor, refugeehood, human trafficking, internal displacement, exile.
This issue brings together names familiar to readers of Arabic literature in translation, such as Ghassan Kanafani and Saadi Youssef, with writers making their English-language debuts, such as Dearborn, MI-based Kurdish Iraqi poet Gulala Nouri and Libyan novelist Mohamad Alasfar. Likewise, the issue includes veteran translators Marilyn Booth, Nancy Roberts, and Khaled Mattawa alongside newcomers, several of them graduate students at the University of Michigan.
Each piece is accompanied by a translator’s reflection that meditates on the work’s themes as well as the creative process of translation, and the issue’s poetry is presented in a side-by-side Arabic-English format.
Absinthe 28 comes to us at a time when, according to the UN, one in every 78 people on earth is displaced. This collection serves as a reminder that translation and migration are inextricably linked.
Graham Liddell
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Graham Liddell
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Ghassan Kanafani and Michael Fares
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Jan Dost and Marilyn Booth
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Haji Jabir and Nancy Roberts
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Gulala Nouri and Ali Harb
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Becky Thompson and Mootacem B. Mhiri
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Saadi Youssef and Khaled Mattawa
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Sara Abou Rashed
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Richid Niny and Angela Haddad
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Nisma Alaklouk and Julia Schwartz
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
Muhammad Diab and Graham Liddell
2022-12-14 Volume 28 • 2022 • Orphaned of Light: Translating Arab and Arabophone Migration
The editors of Absinthe: World Literature in Translation are pleased to announce the launch of our new issue, Orphaned of Light. Edited by Graham Liddell, Absinthe 28 is a collection of contemporary literary works that foreground experiences of migration and refugeehood. The issue highlights new work by Arabophone authors from the US Midwest and from abroad. Additionally, Absinthe [...]
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