The
world is very small. Sometimes another culture, another way of life, lies just
around the corner. If you walk into hall six, go up the escalator and down the
corridor to the right hand side, you will walk from the well organised and quite
Western world into the congested alleys of the Arab markets.
There
are people everywhere, mostly men standing together in groups, talking,
laughing, and making jokes. But although the visitor gets the feeling of having
been transported to the ancient markets of Egypt, Syria, or Morocco, one is in
the middle of the largest Book Fair of the world; the Frankfurt Book Fair 2004.
This
year, the Arab World was guest of honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair. In four
different areas of the fairground the audience had the chance to discover this
region. From poetry and prose readings to dance performances and art
exhibitions, the guest of honor invited the public on a journey through its
culture, art and history. You could start the day at the Book Fair by visiting a
prose reading by Iman Humeidan Younes (Lebanon) and Ahmed Abodehman
(Saudi-Arabia), then attend a lecture on Terrorism in the Arab Forum, and
finally stroll around in the Forum, browse through Arabic books or research the
E-Publications of the Bibliotheca Alexandria. After a dance performance in the
Al-Andalus Auditorium the visitor could end the day at the fair by attending the
poetry reading of the Egyptian poet Abdel-Rahman Al-Abnoudi. But of course, this
is just a fraction of all the possible ways of spending a day at the Book Fair,
where a hundred things are happening simultaneously.
To
invite the Arab world to the Book Fair as the guest of honor has been commented
on by the German press as being both courageous and highly important. Ever since
September 11, it has become even more important to find a way of achieving
dialogue
between
the East and the West. The Book Fair has been seen as a chance to start this
dialogue, to build bridges between cultures, and to give the people in the West
a clearer picture of what Arab culture is. It has been seen as a chance to show
the West that the Arab world is different from the stereotypes that prevail in
the West.
But
did the Arab world make good use of this chance to shed light on its diverse
culture, to display the potential of creativity in that part of the world, and
most importantly, did the Arab world manage to start an open dialogue with the
West in order to give the people in the West a better idea of what the Arab
world is and represents? Was the Book Fair successful in that respect?
“The
person who is responsible for the Tunisian stand is the same person who is
responsible for the censorship in Tunisia”, says Sihem Bensedrine.
|
|
Sihem
Bensedrine does not think so. “We have not used our chance correctly,” says
the Tunisian journalist and author. From her point of view, the problem lies
with the organisers of the Book Fair. They chose a bureaucratic partner for the
organisation of the Fair: The Arab League. “They are not representative of the
Arab book”, explains Bensedrine. “In fact, the opposite. They represent the
censorship of the book, not freedom of expression. Many representatives of the
Arab world who are present also represent censorship in their respective
countries. For example, says the Tunisian.
But
Bensedrine, who writes in French and whose books (L’Europe et ses Despotes:
Europe and its Despots) are forbidden in her country, still thinks that the Book
Fair can and will make a change. “We Arabs know Europe pretty well, but they
don’t know us”, explains the author. “Who are Arab people? What is Arab
culture? To all those questions literature can give an answer. Literature is a
good medium to build bridges,” says Bensedrine, “to make people understand
what Arab culture really is.”
|
|
|
Palestinan
poet Mahmoud Darwish with the translator of his work into
German, the Syrian/German Adel Karasholi.
|
But
in order for Europeans to read Arab literature, books need to be translated. Of
the 125,000 books, fiction and poetry that can be found on the German
book-market at the moment, around 40 percent are translations; only 0.3 percent
of the translations are from the Arab world. There are various reasons for that
situation. On the one hand, the interest of the German public is modest. On the
other hand, not many books are being translated because there are very few
qualified translators.
One
of the most prominent translators of Arabic literature into German was a guest
at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Hartmut Fähndrich, a scholar of Islamic
studies, has translated works by Ibrahim al-Koni, Youssef Idris, Sonallah
Ibrahim, and many others. “To this man, who has been active in this sphere for
almost a quarter of a century, German readers owe the mediation (as translator,
editor, consultant, or intermediary) of an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the
literature translated from Arabic during the past twenty years”, said Stefan
Weidner, who led the discussion with Fähndrich. Stefan Weidner himself has
translated the works of several contemporary Arab poets. He is translator,
literary critic and editor-in-chief of Fikrun wa Fann, published by the
Goethe-Institute.
One
of the main problems with regard to translation that Fähndrich and Weidner
put forward, is that there is practically no one in German publishing houses
that speaks Arabic. In the usual process of finding a book to translate into
German, the publishing house will choose one and will then find a translator.
Normally books are found through a literature agency.
If
it is Arabic literature, the translator stands alone. “He is translator,
editor, consultant, and intermediary at once”, says Stefan Weidner. “And
because the translator needs to play so many roles at once, he cannot really
focus on his actual job, the translation.”
At
the same time, the translator, because of his role as intermediary, often has to
deal with cultural conflicts. “Often Arabs complain that the works we
translate are not representative of Arabic literature”, says Fähndrich.
Fähndrich
has himself translated around 40 works of the most prominent authors in the Arab
world. He explains that lack of sponsorship of translation in the Arab world is
one of the biggest problems. Most of the books that are translated from Arabic
into German have been sponsored by some sort of institution. But these
institutions are in most cases German or Swiss. (Hartmut Fähndrich is Swiss
and works for the Lenos publishing house which is based in Basel). “We are
still waiting for promotion from the Arab side, but in vain”, says Fähdrich.
“Arab institutions, such as the Arab League, have a broken relationship with
their writers,” explains the Swiss translator. “Those institutions, which
should have a vital interest in sponsoring translations into European languages
in order to promote Arab culture and build bridges between East and West, don’
t understand the important meaning literature has in making people aware of the
Arab culture,” says Hartmut Fähndrich.
How
little an institution like the Arab League understands about the importance of
literature, and therefore of the importance of translating and translators, can
be illustrated by an incident during the Book Fair. Hartmut Fähndrich had
been invited by the Arab League to receive an award for his efforts and
achievements in translating Arabic literature into German. “First, they forgot
to inform the press and the public so there was nobody at the ceremony,”
recalls Fähndrich. This was a typical example of the lack of organisation
that many people at the Fair were heard complaining about. But when Hartmut Fähndrich
received his award, he really became angry. “They gave me a medal,” says Fähndrich.
“That is the most the Arab League has to give out.” The translator was not
only angry, he was shocked. “It was really humiliating.”
Not
only do translators earn very little money, especially if they are translating
literature that does not have a large audience, but they also have to put an
enormous amount of effort into their work. Hartmut Fähndrich is an
idealist, like many others in that business, and he can only survive because he
has another job that finances him and the time he puts into translating Arabic.
It should be a concern of the Arab League to sponsor a man like Hartmut Fähndrich
who has done so much to promote Arab culture.
In
general, Arab countries do not seem to have understood the importance of the
Frankfurt Book Fair and the opportunity it presented to them. The organizers of
the Book Fair offered them the chance to exhibit the culture of the Arab world
at the largest literary platform in the world, to open a dialogue, to start
building bridges, and to overcome prejudice. But in many ways, the Arab world
only managed to enforce prejudice and negative images.
|
|
|
Saudia
Arabian Ahmed Abodehman, who wrote the first novel by a Saudi in
the French language, and Lebanese writer Iman Humaydan Younes
read from their own work.
|
In
hall six international publishing houses, and among them Arab publishing houses,
were presented. It seemed as if a little hurricane had whirled through the
corridors when the Arabs were presenting themselves.
The
people, mostly Arabs, where pushing through the corridors just like at the
markets in the Arab world. One could find nuts and leaflets that accuse the West
of giving the Arabs a hard time. “Our backs are burning under the lashes of
the West, demanding reform, change and modernisation”, states one such
leaflet. But what was actually hard to find at the Arab stands were books. The
Saudi stand, which looked, unlike most of the other stands, quite inviting,
offered only a handful of books at a large display area. The only country that
actually managed to combine both an inviting stand and a fair amount of
literature was Egypt.
Most
of the stands looked like the publishing houses had completely forgotten that
they were supposed to go to the largest Book Fair in the world and had quickly
packed some books, a table, and some chairs to represent themselves.
Even
a country like Korea, whose gross income is not much more than the average Arab
country and was not part of the guest of honor program, had not only an
inviting, but also a creative and interesting display area that attracted the
visitors’ eyes.
The
Arabs do not seem to have understood that it is not enough to merely be present
at the Book Fair, but that it is essential to invite and attract the visitors to
start a dialogue and build bridges.
“They
are not approaching people,” concluded Manon Atta, a visitor at the Book Fair,
after walking through the stands of the Arab publishing houses. “Nobody at the
stands speaks German,” added David Fuller, “how are they supposed to open a
dialogue? Are they here to only present themselves to the Arabs?”
Another
aspect of the Arab’s presentation reinforcing stereotypes was the lack of
organisation. This could also have been due to an attitude that might not have
taken the situation as seriously as it should have been. There was a Sudanese
musician who just did not turn up for his performance. Also, many of the public
readings took place without some of the announced authors because they did not
turn up. The performance of the Reda folklore-group had to be cancelled, because
the only CD that the group had brought to the Fair broke.
However,
in spite of some of the relatively poor presentations of the guest of honor, the
2004 Frankfurt Book Fair must in many respects be regarded as a success. The
public, who will mostly have had no idea of what the Arab world is, and know
very little about its culture, its art and its literature, has acquired an idea
and an insight into that world that seems so far away for many people in the
West.
Besides
some of the best in modern art and performances by Arab musicians, the audience
had the opportunity to get a glimpse of the Arab soul by attending poetry and
prose readings by some of the most prominent writers of the Arab world. Those
readings attracted a large audience, both Arab and Western. The beauty of those
readings was that the writer would read his or her own work in Arabic, after
which the German translation was read, sometimes by the translators and
sometimes by an actor. In this way, the Western listener could get a feeling for
the Arabic language, its melody, beauty and strength while at the same time
understanding the meaning of the words.
If
the Frankfurt Book Fair gave the impulse to make people in the West want to know
more about the Arab world and to demand more translations of Arabic literature,
then the Book Fair can be regarded as a success for its guest of honor. At the
same time, there has to be a growing awareness in the Arab world that without
sponsorship of the translation of Arabic literature and the freedom of
expression, no real dialogue is possible.
Amira
Sayed al-Ahl is a journalist based in Germany.
