Radua Ashur

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Radua Ashur (also Radwa Ashour , Arabic رضوى عاشور, DMG Raḍwā ʿĀšūr ; * May 26, 1946 in El-Manial , Cairo ; † November 30, 2014 ibid) was an Egyptian writer and professor of English and comparative literature at Ain Shams University in Cairo. Your Andalusian novel trilogy Granada was named one of the 105 best Arabic novels of the 20th century by the Arab Writers' Association.

Life

Radua Ashur was born in Cairo in 1946 into a literary family. Her grandfather Abdel Wahab Azzam was a diplomat and professor of literature, her father Mustafa Ashur was a lawyer and literature lover, and her mother Mai Azzam was a poet and artist. Radua Ashur studied English literature in Cairo (BA 1967) and specialized in comparative literature (MA 1972). She moved to the United States for her doctorate. In 1975 she received her PhD in African American literature from the University of Massachusetts Amherst with a thesis on African American critical writings and the search for black poetics. She was the first graduate student in English literature to specialize in black American literature. In 1986 she became Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Ain Shams University in Cairo, where she was head of the Department of English Language and Literature from 1990 to 1993.

Radua Ashur wrote novels, short stories and literary reviews. In 1983 she published her first book Die Reise: Memoirs of an Egyptian Student in America, followed two years later by her first novel Ein warm Stein (1985). She achieved great fame with her Granada trilogy (1994–95), a historical novel that documents the rise and fall of Arab civilization in Spain. In 1993 she received the book prize at the Cairo Book Fair and in 1995 the first prize at the first book fair for Arab women authors. Granada was voted one of the 105 best Arabic novels of the 20th century by the Arab Writers' Association.

Ashur was not only active academically and as a writer, but also politically. When Egyptian President Anwar Sadat advocated normalization of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, she helped found the National Committee against Zionism at Egyptian universities. When Hosni Mubarak's government intervened in academic life, it joined the March 9 group calling for the independence of Egyptian universities.

Ashur was married to the Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti, with whom she had a son, Tamim al-Barghouti (born 1977). He is now a famous Egyptian-Palestinian poet himself. Google honored Radua Ashur, who died of cancer on November 30, 2014, with a Google Doodle on May 26, 2018 - her birthday .

Works

Fiction

  • الرحلة: أيام طالبة مصرية في أمريكا ( The Journey: Memoirs of an Egyptian Student in America, arab. 1983) - translated into English ( The Journey: Memoirs of an Egyptian Student in America, 2018)
  • حَجَر دافئ ( Warm Stone, Roman, Arabic 1985)
  • خديجة وسوسن ( Khadija and Sawsan, Roman, arab. 1987)
  • رأيت النخل ( I saw the date palms , short stories, arab. 1987)
  • سراج ( Siraaj, Roman, arab. 1992) - translated into English ( Siraaj: An Arab Tale , 2007)
  • غرناطة ( Granada , Roman trilogy, Arabic 1994–95) - translated into English, Indonesian, Norwegian (Bokmal) and Spanish
  • أطياف ( Ghosts , Roman, Arabic 1999) - translated into English ( Specters , 2010)
  • تقارير السيدة راء ( The reports from Ms. R. , arab. 2001)
  • قطعة من اوروبا ( A piece from Europe , arab. 2003)
  • فرج ( Faraj , arab. 2008) - translated into English ( Blue Lorries , 2008)
  • الطنطورية ( Tantoura , Roman, arab. 2010) - translated into English ( The Woman from Tantoura , 2014)

translation

  • Mourid Barghouti: Midnight and Other Poems . Arc Publications, Todmorden 2008. ISBN 9781906570088 .

Scientific publications

  • The Search for a Black Poetics: A Study of Afro-American Critical Writings . Diss. University of Massachusetts, Amherst 1975.
  • Together with Ferial J. Ghazoul and Hasna Reda-Mekdashi (eds.): Arab Women Writers: A Critical Reference Guide, 1873–1999 . Translated into English by Mandy McClure. The American University in Cairo Press, Cairo 2008. ISBN 9789774161469 .

Awards

  • 1993 Book Prize of the Cairo Book Fair for her trilogy of novels Granada
  • 1995 First prize at the first book fair for Arab women authors in Granada
  • 2007 Constantine Cavafy Prize for Literature
  • 2011 Owais Prize

literature

  • Abier Bushnaq: The Historical Arabic Novel . In: Lisan - Journal of Arabic Literature 11, 2011.
  • I. Dworkin: Radwa Ashour, African American Criticism, and the Production of Modern Arabic Literature . In: Cambridge Journal of Postcolonial Literary Inquiry 5/1, 2018, pp. 1–19.
  • Ferial J. Ghazoul and Barbara Harlow (eds.): The View from Within: Writers and Critics on Contemporary Arabic Literature . American University in Cairo Press, Cairo, 1994. ISBN 9789774243271 .
  • Adrianna Masko: Weaving the Texture of Memories about the Egyptian Revolution of 2011: Autobiographical Fragments by Radwa Ashour. In: Hemispheres 31/1, 2016, pp. 22-29.
  • Mona N. Mikhail: Radwa Ashour. In: Simon Gikandi (Ed.): Encyclopedia of African Literature . Routledge, London, et al. 2003, pp. 44-46. ISBN 0415230195 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Simon Gikandi : Encyclopedia of African Literature . Routledge, London 2003, ISBN 978-1-134-58223-5 , pp. 44–46 (English, full text in Google Book Search).
  2. Radwa Ashour M.: The Search for a Black Poetics: A Study of African-American Critical Writings. Diss. University of Massachusetts, Amherst 1975.
  3. Ali Crolius: Radwa Ashour. In: University of Massachusetts Amherst. 1999, accessed April 29, 2020 .
  4. a b c d Angy Essam: Radwa Ashour: A writer of stance. In: Egypt Today. May 26, 2018, accessed April 29, 2020 .
  5. ^ The Arab Writers Union's 'Top 105' of the 20th Century. In: ArabLit Quarterly & ArabLit. April 21, 2011, accessed April 29, 2020 .
  6. Radua Ashur's 72nd birthday. In: Google Doodle. May 26, 2018, accessed April 29, 2020 .