Synopses & Reviews
Review
"Robyn Creswell’s translation of Ibrahim's exhiliratingly bleak novel gives English-speaking readers a new classic of mid-century existentialism and, at the same time, a window onto an Egypt too few of us have glimpsed in literature or elsewhere." J. M. Coetzee
Review
"The pervasive moral corruption of Nasser's Egypt seeps up between the lines of Ibrahim's seemingly affectless prose. A landmark in Egyptian literature." The New York Review of Books
Review
"Robyn Creswell’s translation of Ibrahim's exhiliratingly bleak novel gives English-speaking readers a new classic of mid-century existentialism and, at the same time, a window onto an Egypt too few of us have glimpsed in literature or elsewhere." Benjamin Kunkel
Review
" marks a significant entry into the diminutive collection of Arabic literature translated into English, providing a dramatic new view of literature to American readers who otherwise see hardly any of it. " Yasmine El Rashidi
Review
"Robyn Creswell has knocked it out of the park with his translation of Sonallah Ibrahim's modern Egyptian classic." J. M. Coetzee
Review
"To this day, is a modernist masterpiece, a peerless provocation and a lodestar in the history of Arabic literature." Lorin Stein The Paris Review Daily
Review
"A controlled howl of fury." The Daily Star - Lebanon
Review
"Bold, uncompromising writing." Jeremy Lybarger Los Angeles Review of Books
Synopsis
is Sonallah Ibrahim's modernist masterpiece and one of the most influential Arabic novels. Composed in the wake of a five-year prison sentence, the semi-autobiographical story follows a recently released political prisoner as he wanders through Cairo, adrift in his native city.
Synopsis
That Smell is Sonallah Ibrahim’s modernist masterpiece and one of the most influential Arabic novels. Composed in the wake of a five-year prison sentence, the semi-autobiographical story follows a recently released political prisoner as he wanders through Cairo, adrift in his native city.
About the Author
Sonallah Ibrahim, the author of eight novels, was born in Cairo in 1937. After studying law at Cairo University he became a journalist. In 1959 he was arrested for his political activities and served five years of a seven-year prison sentence. During that time he wrote Notes from Prison, and shortly after his release composed his pioneering work, That Smell. For several years he lived in Germany and the Soviet Union, and returned to Cairo in 1974 where he has lived ever since. In October 2003 he won the Egyptian government’s Higher Council for Culture Arab Novel Award. At the ceremony Ibrahim declined the prestigious prize, saying he could not accept a literary honor from “a government that lacks the credibility to bestow it.”Robyn Creswell is the translator of Abdelfattah Kilito’s The Clash of Images and poetry editor of The Paris Review. He is an Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature at Brown University.