...Christina Civantos The Egyptian feminist and educator Nabawiyya Musa (1886–1951), after publishing her autobiographical essays serially from 1938 to 1942, published them as a book under the title Ta’rikhi bi-qalami (My history, by my pen). This essay analyzes the material role of literacy...

...Sara Pursley This article discusses the writings of Amina bint Haydar al-Sadr, a prolific Shi‘i intellectual and novelist in Najaf during the 1960s and 1970s more commonly known by her pen name Bint al-Huda (“Daughter of the Right Path”). It examines the author’s ambivalence about marriage...

...Mervat F. Hatem This paper examines the work of Egyptian ‘A’isha Abdel Rahman (who acquired the pen name of Bint al-Shati’ in the 1930s) on the tarajim (biographies) of women of the prophetic households published in the 1950s and the 1960s. It begins by shedding light on personal and intellectual...

... and others which had gone astray She is a rebel who uses her pen and her voice, her ideas and her literature to break walls and hurdles so we can build gardens where we breathe hope Do not lament the darkness of this period, oh miriam As this darkness will inevitably end And as we await...

... March 21, 2021 M y mother, the most beautiful mother, passed on Mother s Day, Sunday, March 21, 2021, at 12:30 p.m. in a hospital far from her daughter and son and her home and her pen and her intimate things. She was the only one to say that I am not a writer and a poet Because whenever I looked...

... fraught relationship with her pen. What did it mean, she asks, for a respectable Egyptian woman to pick up a pen at a time when such an action was considered inappropriate, vulgar, and even dangerous since only men or European women were authorized to JOURNAL OF MIDDLE EAST...

... the meaning of qalam , recount the following prophetic tradition with minor variations: ‘The first thing God created was the Pen, then nun . Nun is ink. God ordered the Pen to write. The Pen asked: “What should I write?” God said: “Write all human actions until the Day of Judgment, their livelihood...

... are eager to visit and off er support, and the grandmothers continuously advise the couple to have another child. Th e novel explores the strains endured by the couple, haunted by memories and apprehensive of what might hap- pen next. Th e narrator becomes pregnant again and slowly...

... own cultural heritage while being fully aware of the patriarchal elements within Arab culture and the Arabic language. Given similar experiences during the twentieth century, these Chinese intellectuals could identify with Nawal’s mission. Her combination of “pen and scalpel” reminds any common...

..., she strove to disrupt self-interested masculine authority and to empower women in their ability to challenge it. When I heard of Nawal’s death, I found myself rereading a short piece of hers titled “Alone with Pen and Paper.” It’s hard to imagine Nawal ever being alone, and indeed the title...

... to the Armenian homeland, true love of the heart). 7 The growing inclination for realism and realist literature was soon realized in Arpiar Arpiarian’s novellas and short stories and Hagop Baronian’s satirical plays and novels, which would be perfected under Krikor Zohrab’s pen at the turn of the next century...

... by the couple, haunted by memories and apprehensive of what might hap- pen next. Th e narrator becomes pregnant again and slowly becomes more involved in her kindergarten-age son’s life. Amid all this, the couples, like many Egyptian middle-class families, face the temptation to sell the fam...

... as chroniclers in time of war. For example, Said Makdisi ( 1999 [1990], 22) wonders, “How to write, what form to choose.” Samman ( 1997 [1976], 5) questions the role of the writer: “Why hadn’t I learned how to take up arms—not just the pen. . . . Whenever some explosion went off, the scratching sound made...

... Yaqub (Ph.D., Near Eastern Studies, University of California, Berkeley) is Assistant Professor of Arabic Language and Culture at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is the author of Pens, Swords, and the Springs of Art: Th e Oral Poetry Dueling of Palestinian...

... line “Riwaya wataniyya bi-qalam watani” (A patriotic novel by a patriotic pen). 10 Karam’s original novels are all more than three hundred pages in length and make use of first-person narration by women, with sporadic appearances by largely off-scene male characters, to tell stories that address...

...Figure 6. Lilian Weisberger. Right: Untitled, 2012. Colored pens, panda, acrylic, and glitter glue on paper, 120 × 85 × 1 cm. Left: Untitled, 2011. Acrylic and panda on plywood, 140 × 100 × 1 cm. ...

... grammar is not only fragile but also superficial: “One single point may turn the meanings all upside down, especially in the Arabic language. Male becomes female because of one point or one stroke of the pen” (9). Gender hierarchy may be no more than “one stroke of the pen.” Apart from...

... the thought that this could be dangerous. “I have to,” I answered as I scribbled my initials. “No, don’t sign,” Ghazi argued, the second the pen was in my hand. But if I thought our love was tragic, nothing could have prepared me for the surgery that killed me. I was killed and brought back...