European Literature Today

28th January, 7pm - 8pm 
Al-Balad Bookstore,
31 Mohamed Mahmoud Street – El Tahrir Square,
next to Cilantro.

LAF is back in Cairo with the fourth event from the series European Literature Today: highlighting the cultural diversity of Europe and presenting its multifaceted literary scene through the work of living authors from different countries.

Meet three authors from Central Europe: Veronika Šikulová (Slovakia) Maja Vidmar and Mirt Komel (Slovenia), introduced in Arabic by lecturer and translator Dr Khaled Biltagi of Al-Alsun Faculty, Ain Shams University.

In January 2008 Egyptian readers in Cairo and Alexandria met writers from Scotland, Wales, Latvia, Slovakia and Slovenia and in May 2008, poets from Catalonia, Estonia, Germany and Malta read their work at the Goethe Institute in Cairo and in the theatre of the Alexandria Library. In January 2009, under the auspices of the Slovak Centre for Information on Literature authors and editors of Stories from the Heart of Europe, an anthology of short stories from Central Europe, visited Cairo and Alexandria to launch the book published by Sphinx Agency.

The number of books from Eastern Europe translated into Arabic is growing and on this occasion, Literature Across Frontiers will be presenting The Murderers (Sphinx, 2009) a collection of short storied by the Slovak author Anton Hykish, translated by Khalid Biltagi, and Anthology of contemporary Slovenian poetry (Toubkal, 2009) translated by Mohsen Alhady and Margit Podvornik Alhady. The reading will also preview an anthology of Slovak women’s short stories, also in translation by Khalid Biltagi, to be published later this year by Cadmus Press in Damascus.

The 4th edition of European Literature Today is organised by Literature Across Frontiers and Slovak Centre for Information on Literature in cooperation with Sphinx Agency and with support from the Center for Slovenian Literature and the Embassy of the Slovak Republic in Egypt.

Read more about LAF's projects in Egypt here.