Stories about Literature from February, 2007
Venezuela: Una tarde con campanas / Juan Carlos Méndez Guédez
Guillermo Parra translates an excerpt from Juan Carlos Méndez Guédez's novel “Una tarde con campanas.” Explains Parra, “the book is narrated by a boy whose family migrates to Madrid after a military government comes to power in Venezuela. Una tarde con campanas was a finalist for the Premio de Novela...
Jamaica: Top ten books
Jamaican novelist Marlon James posts a list of his top ten books.
Jamaica: An evening with a dub poet
Geoffrey Philp posts a podcast of the proceedings from the premiere of a documentary on the life of the Jamaican dub poet Malachi Smith.
Lebanon: Academia, Agriculture and Construction
Let us begin this week’s roundup of the Lebanese blogosphere with non–political posts. Let us start from a post about two Lebanese salads that are used as appetizers during meals: Skylark shows us (Fr) how to prepare Fattush and Tabboule, which are two delicious Lebanese salads that are usually found...
Saudi Arabia: Book Fair
Saudi Jeans reports about a bookfair in his country's capital Riyadh next month. “There will not be any days for families only. The book fair will be open to everybody, men and women, except for the evening period of three days which will be only open to men. I have...
Colombia: 100 Years of Solitude
It is the 40th anniversary of Gabriel García Márquez's Cien años de soledad, described here by Posthegemony as “a long, sprawling novel that lacks much in the way of a conventional plot. Rather, it is full of events and incidents, digressions and flashbacks or flashforwards, not least the famous flashforward...
Top ten Caribbean novels
In response to a meme about books and reading, Geoffrey Philp posts his list of top ten Caribbean novels.
China: Disgraced Party member promoted?
Last autumn, Qin Zhongfei, a low-ranking civil servant in Pengshui County of mid-western China's Chongqing Municipality, wove some sarcastic political humor into a poem and sent it out to a few dozen friends via text and instant message. Charged with slander by then County Party Secretary Lan Qinghua, one of...
Bangladesh: Celebrating the Mother Language day
Today is the International Mother Language Day, an annual event in UNESCO member states to promote linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism. This is mostly the international recognition of Language Movement Day called ‘Ekushey February’, which is commemorated in Bangladesh since 1952, when a number of Bangla-speaking people were massacred...
Egypt: Book Launched in UK
Egyptian blogger Ibn Al Dunya reports that Yaqoubian Building, a book by Egyptian author, Alaa al Aswany, has been launched in the UK.
Bangladesh: In conversation with Raman Mundair
Black and Gray in conversation with Raman Mundair. “All these things are aspects of me and I have many aspects. I am also human, artist, British, Sikh, Indian etc. I find it difficult to reduce myself to one singular identity. My strength is in my multiple identities. Of course I...
Uruguay: Las Hortensias
Posthegemony on the short story, “Las Hortensias” by Uruguayan author, Felisberto Hernández [ES].
Slovenia: Culture Day
Wu Wei writes about Slovenia's Culture Day – here and here.
Caribbean: New online literary magazine
Caribbean Free Radio announces the arrival of a new Caribbean online literary magazine; Nicholas Laughlin provides an excerpt from one of the pieces in the inaugural issue.
Ukraine: Children's Book
Ukraine List writes about the adaptation of Richard Scarry's The Best Word Book Ever into Ukrainian and French.
Re-writing the history of Cambodia
Cambodia’s most prominent literary scholar Keng Vannsak lately unveiled a shocking finding of the life of twelfth-century King Jayavarman VII. As a Buddhist ruler of the Khmer Empire, the sage king who governed the kingdom during its most glorious period in the history, is regarded with great respect and widely...
Africa: reading Chinua Achebe
Enanga's Pov on reading Chinua Achebe, “One of them was Chinua Achebe’s essay, An image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Never have I, on reading something, agreed with someone so strongly that it brought the tears to my eyes. Never have I admired a writer more.”
Cuba: Soyinka in Havana
Jesús Risquet reports on Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka's attendance at the 16th International Book Fair in Havana, Cuba.
Israel: Plagiarism
Israeli blogger Nathan tells us all we need to know about the different types of plagiarists out there.
South Asia: unemployment, congregation, cricket, richest beggar and extra bed for bloggers
South Asia is one of the poorest regions in the world. Unemployment is one of the major problems for all the countries in this region. South Asia Biz writes a series on the employment situation in South Asia. The biz blog reviews online job portals from Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan,...
Jamaica: Happy birthday, John Hearne
Geoffrey Philp marks the birthday of Jamaican novelist John Hearne: “He had to tread carefully, I suspect, as a white Jamaican who did not sound Jamaican, in a society that was changing rapidly and in which the privileges, which a generation before a person in his situation would have taken...