The Arab world was 'market focus' at last week's London Book Fair, part of the present western interest in the literature of the region, writes David Tresilian Amid the bustle of London's annual Book Fair, Europe's second largest after Frankfurt, space this year was set aside for a series of presentations on aspects of literary life in the Arab world, taking in publishers, authors and, perhaps most importantly, foreign rights and potential foreign sales. While there was never a less than polite turnout for Book Fair panels on subjects such as a "panorama of academic research in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia," informative and interesting under the chairmanship of Saad Al-Bazei of King Saud University in Riyadh, visitors to the Fair turned out in greater numbers for presentations offering more obvious commercial interest, such as those on the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (the Arab Booker Prize) and Arabic Fiction and the UK Market. In his remarks at the 'chairman's breakfast' that opened the Arab focus events, Amr Moussa, speaking in his capacity as secretary-general of the Arab League, said that events such as the London Fair could "enlarge understanding and contribute to dialogue between nations," as well as correct the "stereotypical picture of Arabs and Muslims" that has sometimes circulated in western countries. However, events at the Fair itself gave the impression that what many visitors were looking for was a new bestseller to match Egyptian author Alaa Al Aswany's recent The Yacoubian Building, or Afghan author Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner, a kind of mélange of Afghan themes that signaled an interest among western publishers for works of fiction set in Muslim countries. Both books have become unlikely bestsellers in the UK and in the western fiction market more generally, with Al Aswany and Hosseini now in demand at all sorts of publishing events, not least, in Al Aswany's case, last week in London where he was prominently interviewed along with visiting British and other foreign authors. Would the "Arab market focus" at this year's London Fair reveal a new Arab talent that might put even Al Aswany in the shade? The question was left unanswered, but it was clear from the way in which events were reported that this was a question on many visitors' minds. Organised in cooperation with the British Council, some of the Arab focus events had a rather bureaucratic character. For English, or even English- speaking, readers, British Council events can tend to conjure up images of consensual talks by approved authors, and there was a lecture-circuit air about some of the panels. While Samia Mehrez's introductory talk to the session on "Trends in Contemporary Arabic Fiction" was interesting, for example, challenging the audience to reconsider the idea of "place" in contemporary Arabic literature, some of those on the panel that followed did not seem to have thought very much about either trends or place, or if they had had decided not to communicate it. Ahmad Alaidy, author of the cult novel Being Abbas El Abd, gave a sort of "anti-talk," recommending only that those present read his novel. Lebanese author Hassan Daoud gave an overview of his oeuvre, while Algerian writer Aziz Chouaki talked lengthily, but not always relevantly, about language issues in Algeria. Only Saudi author Raja Alsanea spoke on topic, talking interestingly about her successful novel Girls of Riyadh and receiving the lion's share of questions from the audience. Translated into 23 languages and started when the author was only 18, this novel, Alsanea explained, could be seen as having captured the experience of a generation of young Saudi women who have used the Internet -- blogs, forums and chat sites -- to create a "virtual liberating space" allowing freedom of expression. A new language, "Arabish," had been invented for use in this space, consisting of a mix of English and colloquial Arabic written in the Latin alphabet. Asked whether the success of Girls of Riyadh in translation had surprised her, Alsanea said that she had collaborated on the English translation and was aware that "western readers are more interested in Saudi Arabia than they are in Saudi literature." She was not "a feminist or an activist," though the novel did show up the "confused boundary" between "freedom in virtual space and the traditions that dominate the non-virtual space of family and society." For his part, Alaidy said that while he had not written Being Abbas El Abd with translation in mind, one foreign author, the American Chuck Palahniuk, had been an important influence. It might be interesting for his novel "to be translated into Arabic," he said mischievously, though his intention had been to make it "impossible to translate" into that language ( Being Abbas El Abd is written in a chaotic mix of registers and draws heavily on the colloquial language). This session was followed by another on International Prizes and the Arab World, chaired by Boyd Tonkin of the London newspaper The Independent. As someone on this panel doubtless pointed out, while the cash value of literary prizes in Europe is unimportant compared to their value in increased sales and, often, in film and other rights -- France's Prix Goncourt is an obvious example -- this is not necessarily true in the Arab world. Here, the cash value of a prize can be worth far more than any resulting boost in sales, which have a habit of remaining disappointing. As Mark Linz, director of the American University in Cairo Press put it when talking about the Press's Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature, while the role of the Mahfouz Medal is to draw attention to an important author and literary work, this in itself does not always translate into the sale of foreign rights or increased sales for the original language edition. "The market effect is not guaranteed," he said. For Jonathan Taylor, chairman of the Booker Prize Foundation and also on the panel, the intention behind last year's establishment of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (the Arab Booker Prize) was to create a prize on the model of the British Man Booker Prize, now the foremost UK "brand" and having a reputation for integrity. The Arab prize was designed to function in a similar way to the original, aiming to secure translation of the winning work into foreign languages and its author's wider recognition. Something similar had also been the aim of the Saif Ghobash-Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation, introduced by Margaret Obank, editor of the UK magazine Banipal, which publishes modern Arabic literature in English translation. This prize, she said, aimed to reward the translator of a literary work, as well as to encourage further translations. These two events set the scene for others spread across the days that followed, from which two panels were perhaps particularly rewarding: "translation and the dialogue of civilisations" and "an audience with the International Prize for Arabic Fiction nominees." The first event, organised by the General Egyptian Book Organisation (GEBO) which also had a stand at the Fair, saw GEBO chairman, Nasser el-Ansary, joined by Ibrahim el-Muallim, chairman of the Arab Publishers Association and of the Cairo publishers Dar el-Shorouq, and Mohamed Salmawy, secretary- general of the Arab Writers Union, debate translation while also making a determined pitch for the translation of Egyptian books. All three speakers highlighted what they called the "problem of selection": translation is not "a one- way street," they said, and western publishers have sometimes been guilty of translating works that are either not representative of the local scene or that answer to inaccurate conceptions of what Arabic literature is like. El-Ansary complained of what he called the "ignorance" of people in the North about those in the South, pointing out that it was impossible to have real dialogue in the absence of knowledge. However, it was Mohamed Salmawy's contribution that was the most intriguing. Having begun by agreeing with his colleagues on the necessity for proper "selection" in order that "the right picture" of Arabic literature be given to non-Arabic-speaking readers, Salmawy performed a volte face when answering questions by suggesting that "everything should be translated" without any selection whatsoever. Since "my view of a country's production may differ from someone else's," he said, pluralism demanded that "we should translate as much as possible. Even things we don't think are good should be translated," since this was the only way that foreign readers would be able to appreciate the diversity of Arab literary production and be in a position to judge for themselves. Selection of the most rigorous sort had, however, led to the short-listing of writers for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, and in his introductory remarks to this panel of the six short-listed authors critic Faisal Darraj discerned some common themes. Joining the works of the writers -- May Menassa and Jabbour Douaihy (Lebanon), Khaled Khalifeh (Syria), Elias Farkouh (Jordan), Mekkaoui Said, and the winner, Baha Taher (both from Egypt) -- was a concern for "social deterioration," he said, whether expressed through sectarianism, corruption, political repression or "the failure of enlightenment" in Arab societies. Each writer gamely agreed with the main lines of Darraj's analysis, while adding biographical material of his or her own. This led to two general propositions: that the novel in Arab societies has a special documentary role, attempting a description and perhaps a clarification of those societies' present situation; and that the novel, as a "democratic literary form" having a special relationship to the development of civil society, has a particular social role to play. While it could offer analysis, as in Bahaa Taher's Sunset Oasis, which won this year's prize, it could also insert itself within the "narrative of enlightenment," offering a space and a medium for debate. On the floor of the Fair itself the kind of discussion going on in the Arab focus seminar rooms could seem far-removed from the hard-nosed business of buying and selling, as detailed in issues of the London Book Fair Daily and The Bookseller handed out to visitors. Here, one learned about the latest trends in book marketing, as well as about the activities of agents and their clients and what was going on at the round of publishers' parties accompanying the Fair. No major deals involving Arab authors were reported on, though coverage of the Arab focus was extensive and generally well- informed. At the end of a stimulating couple of days spent at this year's London Book Fair, the only real complaint concerned hospitality. No refreshments were provided for any of the Arab focus panels, meaning that those attending, having completed the "evaluation forms" and had their badges scanned for the umpteenth time, were obliged to run downstairs and queue if they wanted a cup of coffee.
