Short Stories, Letters and Essays about the Middle East

imageAfter six years of living in Cairo, my writing began to shift, from a reliance on realistic narrative to that based on the fabulous and the fantastical. Many of these new stories were inspired by anecdotes in my neighborhood. Because I speak Arabic, many of my sources for the new stories were the gatekeepers of the building where I live, who told me stories about neighbors and daily life in Cairo. The gatekeepers’ interpretations of daily events in the building have often inspired my fiction. For example, in “The Empty Flat Upstairs,” my Japanese neighbor claimed that her neighbors upstairs were drilling a hole in her ceiling so that they could spy on her. The gatekeepers’ anecdotes about her paranoia gave me the idea to write a story about a Japanese woman who is driven crazy by the desire for “the literal truth” about an empty flat upstairs, which is officially empty, but often used as a crash pad by neighbors and relatives. Her desire for “the literal truth,” shows her cultural alienation and displacement since Egyptian culture does not place a high value on “the literal truth” or on facts, but on maintaining appearances. Read more...

 

Latest News



Online Publishers Sites

Essays and short stories have been published in The Barcelona Review, Archipelago, Storysouth... Learn more...

My Latest Short Stories

The latest short stories are the Egyptian short stories, Learn more...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Current Visitors

We have 1 guest online

Stories from Egypt

Egyptian Short Stories

Even though I was planning to write a second novel set in Tuscaloosa, Alabama; instead, I began writing a number of stories, which were inspired by the magic of daily life in Cairo. The second surprise: I abandoned realistic narrative. Learn more...

Egyptian Essays

The publication of my Syrian essays encouraged me to write a series of essays about the atmosphere in Cairo before the beginning of the war in Iraq. Learn more...

Stories from Syria

Syrian Essays

I kept a detailed notebook during my Fulbright in Syria 1997-1999. From these notes, I wrote a series of essays about my experiences in Lattakia, Syria after I left the country in 1999.



Learn more...

Other Stories

Other Essays

After my Fulbright in Syria, I got a job teaching writing in the Writing Program at the American University in Cairo. I wrote a series of essays about life in Cairo, before the second Gulf War for the Barcelona Review.

I also completed two short plays, which were staged in the Famous for Fifteen Theatre Festival at the university.

 

Learn more...

Publishers

Publishers Links

Essays and short Short Stories have been published in The Barcelona Review, Archipelago, Storysouth... Learn more...