A new chapter for Saudi writers begins at London Book Fair

LONDON: Representatives of Saudi Arabia’s Literature, Publishing and Translation Commission took part in the London Book Fair this week, with the aim of continuing its work to build an international audience for writers in the Kingdom.

The commission’s participation at the three-day event, which concluded on Thursday, came as part of its Tarjim, or “Translate,” initiative that was launched in 2020 as part of Vision 2030. It provides funding for the translation of “important” Arabic content, to make it available to a wider global audience and help address outdated perceptions of the Kingdom.

“The main goal is to enhance Arabic content by funding translation,” Mohammed Hasan Alwan, the CEO of the commission, told Arab News.

“But our aim is also to bridge the gap between the Arabic language and other cultures and languages, and we are pleased to see that it is making excellent progress. Our initiative is constantly expanding.”

An initial 250 grants were handed out in 2021, and plans to translate 500 works in 2022 increased to 700, leaving Alwan and his team “delighted” with the progress.

Among the works that have been translated is Jumana Al-Sehaiti’s COVID-19-inspired “Dear X,” which started out as a series of daily letters and diary entries the author wrote to herself during the first eight months of the pandemic. She revised and assembled them into a novel at the suggestion of her publisher.

Al-Sehaiti said the commission’s translation program has benefits for writers that go beyond increased readership, as she sees it as further evidence of the recent social progress in the Kingdom.

“I published my first book in 2008, a time when women had a limited role in the literature field (in Saudi Arabia) but it’s beginning to expand, thanks to the crown prince and the Ministry of Culture,” she told Arab News.

“Every writer likes to have readers but the more I can expand on my circle of readers the more I can expand on myself as a reader, and this will only expand upon my way of writing.”

While the Ministry funds the translation programme, it leaves the responsibility of selecting the books with a number of publishers. One of them is Nomad, the publisher of “Dear X,” which was also at the London Book Fair to showcase five of 50 works it has translated that are due for release this year.

“We started the project last year … with the (translation) process taking three to four months per book,” Nomad’s director, Max Scott, told Arab News.

“The commission essentially leaves us to determine which works should go forward — we have 70 more in the pipeline — and what we look for are works that will have a genuine interest to international readers.”

Scott said that the books he and his team have worked on cover a wide range of writing in the Kingdom, including some works that tackle sensitive or challenging subject matter that might have been taboo in the past.

By way of an example, he highlights “Dates and Bullets,” which is about the Seferberlik, the forced conscription of Arabs by the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. Nomad has also translated the horror novel “Room 8,” he added, and poetry collection “I Know Well the Face of Despair” by Hatem Al-Shahri.

“Some of the books we have worked on have been printed multiple times in Saudi Arabia,” Scott said. “And while domestic success is obviously taken into consideration, for us as a publisher, our focus is as much on finding works that show an alternative side of Saudi Arabia, one that we feel sometimes gets lost amid the noise.”

Author Al-Onaid Al-Rashidy achieves this sort of fresh perspective with her sci-fi novel “Haleya: The Girl Who Combats Fear,” which takes as its inspiration the Saudi nomadic communities of the past.

“I based it off Saudi folklore and the way Bedouin tribes lived,” she told Arab News. “Our ancestors lived in the desert and I based my novel off their stories and oral history, and the life of a Bedouin man who was characterised by bravery, generosity and strength.”

Commission CEO Alwan said that this year the organization aims to provide grants for the translation of at least 750 works.

There are also plans to translate more Arabic works into languages other than English. A spokesperson for the ministry told Arab News that each year they will look to expand into additional languages, and also translate more foreign works into Arabic.

“We are optimistic about the future of Tarjim and hope to receive high quality translation grant requests from publishers,” said Alwan.

“This will enable us to further enhance the quality of Arabic content and promote Saudi writers on a larger scale but, more importantly, foster cross-cultural understanding and appreciation, as we have successfully translated from 14 other languages into Arabic.”