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Home > Translation > The World Bookshelf > Books > The Yacoubian Building

The Yacoubian Building

This exceptional Egyptian novel – as mesmerising as it is controversial – caused an unprecedented stir when it was first published in Arabic. Welcome to the Yacoubian Building, Cairo: once grand, now dilapidated, and full of stories and passion. Some live in squalor on its rooftop while others inhabit the faded glory of its apartments and offices. Within these walls religious fervour jostles with promiscuity; bribery with bliss; modern life with ancient culture. At ground level, Taha, the doorman’s son, harbours career aspirations and romantic dreams – but when these are dashed by unyielding corruption, hope turns to bitterness, with devastating consequences.
‘A superbly crafted feat of storytelling.’
Sunday Telegraph

The book was the inspiration for the highest-budget Arabic-language film ever, which was released to much acclaim in 2006.

In February 2007 Alaa Al Aswany was in discussion about the novel at Foyle’s in Charing Cross Road.

Author

Alaa Al Aswany

Alaa Al Aswany

Books

The Yacoubian Building

A journalist and one of the Arab world’s bestselling novelists, Alaa Al Aswany is the author of The Yacoubian Building, Chicago and Friendly Fire. By day he has worked as a dentist in Cairo, where he had his first office in the Yacoubian Building, and by night he is a writer, published in over twenty languages worldwide.

Translator

Humphrey Davies

Humphrey Davies

Books

Gate of the Sun

The Yacoubian Building

Yalo

I Was Born There, I Was Born Here

Humphrey Davies holds a PhD in Near East Studies from the University of California, Berkeley. He has spent 36 years working and living in the Arab world – 20 of these in Egypt, with lengthy periods in Palestine, Sudan and Tunisia.  He works out of Arabic (both formal and four dialects: Egyptian Arabic, Sudanese, Tunisian and Palestinian).

His translations include Ala’ Al-Aswani’s The Yacoubian Building, Naguib Mahfouz’s Thebes at War and Sayed Ragab’s ‘El Far’ (‘Rat’) – a short story in Egyptian Arabic, published in Banipal Magazine (Summer 2002)

In addition to his translation work, he has worked for the Ford Foundation in Cairo and Khartoum; for the Save the Children Federation; and for Oxford University Press. He is based in Cairo.

Published by

Fourth Estate, 2007
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This exceptional Egyptian novel – as mesmerising as it is controversial – caused an unprecedented stir when it was first published in Arabic. Welcome to the Yacoubian Building, Cairo: once grand, now dilapidated, and full of stories and passion. Some live in squalor on its rooftop while others inhabit the faded glory of its apartments and offices. Within these walls religious fervour jostles with promiscuity; bribery with bliss; modern life with ancient culture. At ground level, Taha, the doorman’s son, harbours career aspirations and romantic dreams – but when these are dashed by unyielding corruption, hope turns to bitterness, with devastating consequences.
‘A superbly crafted feat of storytelling.’
Sunday Telegraph

The book was the inspiration for the highest-budget Arabic-language film ever, which was released to much acclaim in 2006.

In February 2007 Alaa Al Aswany was in discussion about the novel at Foyle’s in Charing Cross Road.

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