Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 59 Fatima Alblooshi United Arab Emirates University Alaa Alasfour Imam Abdulrahman bin Faisal University The Translation Flow of Arabic Novels into English Over Time Introduction Translation plays a significant role in introducing new literary genres, themes, and concepts that enrich the source language writer’s style and also broaden the receiving language, as numerous thinkers, ranging from Schleiermacher, von Humbolt, Goethe, Berman, and Venuti, have noted. As Nicky Es and Johan Heilbron observed, transla- tion can also change the position of literary works and authors from the periphery “to the center of the global literary world” (2015, 296). In the Arab world translation has a long history and has played a significant role in enriching literature, but the 19th century marked a turning point in the history of translation since it marked the beginning of the novel as a genre in modern Arabic literature. Muhammad Badawi (1992) categorized the trajectory of the Arabic novel into three periods: translation and adaptation (1834–1914), romanticism and nationa- lism (1918–1938), and conflicting ideologies (1945–present). These phases emerged after political crises like Napoleon’s occupation, World War I, and World War II. The novel gained broad recognition in the Arab world during the period of Western colonization (1881–1963). During the 1960s, the Arab world went through drastic political, economic and social changes, which also had significant impacts on the development of Arabic lite- rature in general and the Arabic novel in particular. To put it in Roger Allen’s words, in these years “the Arabic novel now enters a new, more committed phase of its de- velopment, one which makes full use of the work of pioneers in the genre to achieve a greater maturity” (1992, 197). Allen (1995) classified the modern Arabic novel into three main topics, reflecting historical, cultural, and political events. The topics inclu- de conflicts and confrontations, the Arab world and Europe, and societal transforma- tions after independence. DOI:10.4312/ars.17.1.59-75 AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 59 1. 09. 2023 13:30:50 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 60 The current study highlights the transformation of this hybrid genre when it cros- sed the Arabic borders to the Western world, and fills a void in the knowledge of the translation flow of Arabic novels into English by focusing on the three main actors of translation –the authors, translators, and publishers across three decades (1988–2018). It also pinpoints the location where most of the Arabic novels are translated and pu- blished and identifies the novel topics that were selected for translation into English. 1 The historical development of the translation of Arabic novels into English Although Arabic literary works have been long ignored by Western publishing hou- ses, some Arabic novels have found their way onto the English literary market. Abdel Wahab Khalifa and Ahmed Elgindy (2014) discuss the translation movements of Ara- bic fiction in the twentieth century, which they classified into four stages: (1) the ini- tial phase of little interest (1908–1967), (2) the expanding phase of academic interest (1968–1988), (3) the post-Nobel phase of public interest (1988–2001), and finally, (4) the post-9/11 phase of expanded public interest (2001–present). The number of translated Arabic novels published in English before 1988, accor- ding to UNESCO’s Index Translationum, was small, at only 37, compared to the num- ber of translated novels in the latter stages of this transformation where major cultural and political events played a significant role in shaping the processes of production and reception of translated Arabic novels. The Nobel Prize was thus the landmark that redirected the attention of publishers worldwide toward Arabic literature, as they then became aware of the academic be- nefit of owning the publishing rights of Arabic fiction. It was a turning point in the history of Arabic literature and served “as a vehicle for intercultural dialogue and exchange” between Arabic culture and the rest of the world (Peterson). Still, by the mid-1990, it became clear that the Anglophone readers’ interest in Arabic literature was just a temporary phenomenon, not a long-term trend, and this resulted in a reduc- tion in both the number of publishers and the funds spent on Arabic translation. During the mid-1990s, the translation of Arabic novels entered a stagnation phase that lasted until the traumatic events of 11 September, 2001. After the 9/11 attacks, the translation of Arabic literature entered a crucial phase with a significant shift in the language and translation fields in the US and UK. Since then, the Middle East has gone through other significant political events that have influenced Arabic literature and provided fruitful material for fiction. For example, there was the Iraq invasion in 2003 and its aftermath and the pro- -democracy uprisings in 2010, also known as the Arab Spring. It seems that political events that occur in the Arab world have resulted in a significant boost to translation AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 60 1. 09. 2023 13:30:50 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 61 from Arabic into English. As a whole, geo-economic, geo-political, and geo-cultural events have indeed played a significant role in shaping the processes of production of translated Arabic novels in the Anglophone world from 1988, after the Nobel Prize was awarded to Naguib Mahfouz, until the present day. However, despite the impacts of these different events, the influence of geo-political causes seems to be the most visible and important with regard to the translation of Arabic literature. According to Büchler and Guthrie (2011), the number of Arabic literary works translated between 1990 and 2000 was 115, whereas from 2001 to 2011 the rate of translation increased, with a total of 180 books translated. The same study also found that among the various different ge- nres in Arabic literature, the novel is the most commonly translated genre into English, representing 62 percent of the total translations that occurred between 1990 to 2011. 2 Methodology UNESCO’s Index Translationum provides a bibliography of works that were tran- slated and published before 2010. This study complements that effort by creating an up-to-date bibliography (1988–2018) specifically for the Arabic novels translated into English. The study includes 277 Arabic novels written by Arab authors (192 men and 85 women) of different nationalities that have been translated into English and publi- shed between 1988 and 2018. The collected data are distributed among 53 publishers in six countries: Canada, Egypt, India, Qatar, the UK and US. It should also be noted that this study limits its coverage to the first printed editions of translated Arabic novels that appeared first in English by publishers in any part of the world. The data was collected through consulting WorldCat, the US Library of Congress global union library catalogue, and Goodreads, a social website that offers an extensive database of translated books published anywhere in the world. Using Khalifa and Ahmed Elgindy’s (2014) phases, as given above, this study divi- des the collected materials into two main categories based on the date of publication. The first category includes 61 Arabic novels that were translated and published into English after the Nobel Prize was awarded to Naguib Mahfouz in 1988. This period is referred to as the “post-Nobel Prize phase”. The second category, here referred to as the “post-9/11 phase”, includes 216 Arabic novels that were translated between 2001 and 2018. 2.1 The Method of Compilation The corpus for this study is compiled according to the time of publication, edition number, genre, and language directionality, i.e., all the compiled books are novels, first printed editions, and those novels translated from Arabic into English. All bi- bliographic data pertinent to the novels are compiled in an Excel spreadsheet and classified into ten different categories: title of the original work, author, nationality AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 61 1. 09. 2023 13:30:50 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 62 of the author, gender of the author, year of publication of the original, publisher of the original, title of the translated work, translator(s), year of publication of the trans- lation, and publisher of the translation. 2.2 Descriptive Statistics for the Quantitative Data Although the collected novels are classified into two main groups – the post-Nobel Prize phase and the post-9/11 phase – further classification was required to facilitate greater descriptive analysis. For example, each of these categories was further divided into various subcategories, based on the nationality and gender of the translators and the authors of the original works. 2.3 Qualitative Data: The Range of Topics in the Translated Arabic Novels Allen’s (1995) framework was chosen to analyse the reviews, summaries, and de- scriptions of the translated Arabic novels. Using NVivo software, the collected texts were coded at the paragraph level to operationalize and quantify the recurring topics. Since Allen’s model was formulated two decades ago, it is not surprising that new topics and subtopics reflecting a variety of subsequent events emerged during this analysis, thus requiring further modification of the proposed model. The modified version includes a new classification of a book’s main focus, i.e., historical focus, cultural focus, and philosophical focus. In some cases, a book can have a combination of focuses, and if so, that focus is referred to here as a hybrid focus. Each of these categories includes a variety of topics. The first focus includes ancient history, the history of the Islamic and the Arab worlds, modern period con- flicts and confrontations, and societal transformations after independence. The second focus includes the Arab world and the West, non-urban life in the Arab world, and finally several contemporary issues (such as political corruption, religious extremism, social discrimination, patriarchy and the oppression of women). Finally, the philo- sophical focus includes spiritual, psychological, and literary topics that discuss the meaning of life and death, faith and religion and the world of writing. 3 The main actors in the translation of Arabic novels 3.1 Names of Authors Regarding the most translated novelists in the post-Nobel Prize phase, it is not surpri- sing that the Egyptian author and the Nobel Laureate for in literature in 1988, Naguib Mahfouz, stands at the top of the list, with a total of 11 novels published across the AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 62 1. 09. 2023 13:30:50 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 63 13-year period (see Figure 1). For the most translated female novelist, Nawal El Saa- dawi, another Egyptian author, stands in first place with a total of five translated novels. In the post-9/11 period, as in the previous period, Mahfouz is the most translated male author with a total of 10 novels, followed by the Libyan novelist Ibrahim al-Ko- ni, with eight. The third most translated novelist is Jurji Zaydan, the Lebanese educa- tor, journalist, historian, and writer. For women authors the Egyptian author Radwa Ashour, along with the Palestinian writer Sahar Khalifeh, have the highest number of translated novels, at five each. In second place is the female Lebanese writer, Iman Humaydan, with a total of four translated novels. When examining all the main Arab novelists that have been translated into English, one can see that many of these authors were living, working or training outside their homelands. It is even more intriguing to note that all the major women writers, except for the Palestinian novelist Liana Badr, had their education or were working in the US or France at some point in their careers. In addition, many of these authors are curren- tly living abroad with their families where they also work as academics or journalists. Based on the collected data, of the 18 major Arab novelists who had a minimum of two translated novels during the periods under study, 13 had to leave their country either by choice or by force. It is thus likely that by living abroad these Arab authors had a better chance of being translated and published in English and other languages. Figure 1: The Most Translated Novelists. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 63 1. 09. 2023 13:30:51 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 64 3.2 Names of Translators Figure 2 lists the names of translators who translated a minimum of two Arabic novels during the two noted phases. Peter Theroux and Farouk Abdel Wahab are the leading translators during the post-Nobel Prize phase, translating a total of five and four no- vels, respectively. Theroux is an American author and translator of Arabic, who tran- slated a total of 15 Arabic novels into English, before, during, and after the post-Nobel Prize phase. The main female translators are Catherine Cobham and Frances Liardet. Figure 2: List of Main Arabic Translators. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 64 1. 09. 2023 13:30:51 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 65 As indicated in Figure 2, above, during the post-9/11 phase the number of translators who were involved in the translation flow of Arabic novels into English increased, and numerous translators worked on translating more than two novels. The most prolific male translators of Arabic literature are William M. Hutchins, Roger Allen, and Jo- nathan Wright, while Nancy N. Roberts, Marilyn Booth, and Aida Bamia are the three main active female translators of Arabic novels. According to the collected data, out of the 30 prolific translators, 20 are acade- mics and educators at universities and other education institutions. In other words, academic translators represent 60% of the main Arabic-English literary translators, and thus play a significant role in enriching the fields of Arabic language, literature, and translation not only through their research and writings, but also through their ‘critical translations’ of Arabic books. 3 3 Publishers Figure 3 below shows the number of novels published by different types of publishers during the two periods under study here. The publishers and their imprints are divided into four main categories. First are the commercial publishers, who operate on a for- -profit basis where their books and materials are printed and produced for commercial sale. Second are the university presses, and they are concerned with academic, scho- larly, and intellectual publishing and target a small audience of specialists. Third are the non-profit organizations who are involved in publishing in an attempt to be part of the scholarly communication discussion and turn research journals into a free public resource. Finally, there is self-publishing, which also includes independent publishers with only a small number of annual sales. Figure 3: Types of Publishers. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 65 1. 09. 2023 13:30:51 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 66 As shown in Figure 3, in Egypt during the post-Nobel Prize phase all the novels were translated and published by an academic press, the American University in Cairo Press. In the UK, Arabic novels were published by seven independent small presses. In the US, Arabic novels were published by academic presses as well as commercial publishers. Overall, the percentage of novels published by small independent presses, academic presses, and commercial publishers were 47%, 43%, and 10%, respectively. During the post-Nobel Prize phase, most of the Arabic novels were published in the UK, but Egypt became the main publishing country in the post-9/11 phase, and a total of 86 Arabic novels were translated and published there, and then distributed worldwide. In second place in this second period is the US, with a total of 76 novels, followed by the UK with 34. Other countries who have published notable numbers of Arabic novels include Qatar, Canada, and India with a total of 20 books. Although Khalifa and Elgindy (2014) stated that the translation of Arabic fiction into English was expanded to address the public interest in the fourth phase (2001– present), the data gathered in the present study suggests otherwise. As noted earlier in Figure 2, over 60% of the main translators of Arabic novels in both phases work in academia, and most of the Arabic novels are published by academic and small inde- pendent presses. In other words, the interest in this literature is still limited to acade- mia and a small group of readers. Arabic novels have not yet attracted the attention of wider audiences. It also can be argued that Arabic fiction is not the first choice of most commercial presses, as their main goal is to find books that will attract numerous readers and sell very well. 4 The focus and topics of Arabic novels translated into English The translated Arabic novels examined in this study generally focus on three major to- pics and themes -- history, culture, and philosophy. In many cases, these books have a hybrid focus, meaning that they address two or more of these aspects at the same time. Books discussing culture and history account for 46% and 45% of the collected titles, respectively. Philosophical books, on the other hand, are the least represented, with 27 titles and just 9% of the total. The historical books in the data cover various topics, including ancient history, Islamic history, modern conflicts, and societal transforma- tion after gaining independence. Those books with a cultural focus revolve around three main topics: the Arab world and the West, contemporary issues (e.g., political and economic corruption, patriarchy and the oppression of women) and non-urban life in the Arab world. The third topic, philosophy, has two main focuses, the spiritual and psychological (i.e., the meaning of life and death, faith and religion), along with literary themes related to the world of writing. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 66 1. 09. 2023 13:30:51 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 67 The order of the topics in our data, from the most common to the least, is as fol- lows: contemporary issues (34%), modern period conflicts and confrontations (32%), the Arab world and the West (7%), spiritual and psychological issues (7%), societal transformation after independence (6%), non-urban life in the Arab world (6%), hi- story of the Islamic and the Arab worlds (5%), literary issues (2%), and finally ancient history (1%). Figure 4 illustrates the comparison between the focuses of the translated books written by male and female authors. According to the data, male authors mainly focus on historical issues (47%), followed by cultural ones (42%), and then philosophical books, at 11% of the total. In contrast, the data shows that books written by female authors tend to revolve around culture first (54%), then history (41%) and finally philosophical books (constituting only 5% of their overall translated publications). Figure 4: The Focus and Topics of Translated Novels by Male Vs. Female Authors. In terms of main topics, the data shows certain tendencies in both groups. For instan- ce, books addressing ancient history like the Roman and Pharaonic eras are exclusi- vely written by male authors. Male authors also dominate topics like the history of the Islamic and Arab worlds (8%), as well as non-urban life in the Arab world (7%). Female authors, on the other hand, have written more books on topics related to the Arab world and the West (11%), contemporary issues (39%), and modern period con- flicts and confrontations (34%). The most common subtopic in the male authors’ corpus is political and economic corruption in the Arab world, followed by historical events and confrontations in mo- dern Egypt, like the July Revolution, the Suez Crisis, 1967, and so on. The third and fourth subtopics in the male author’s corpus are social corruption, which is very com- mon in this corpus, followed by the plight of the Palestinians, as well as issues related to patriarchy, tradition, and the oppression of women. In contrast, the first subtopic on AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 67 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 68 the list of the female authors’ corpus is, not surprisingly, patriarchy, tradition, and the oppression of women, a subtopic that is in fourth place in the male authors’ list. Leba- non and its Civil War comes in second place in the female authors’ list, followed by two subtopics – the plight of the Palestinians and political and economic corruption. For this time period, Figure 5 shows an increase in the percentage of historical books translated into English, up from 40% during the post-Nobel Prize phase to 46% in the post-9/11 phase, while books with a cultural focus declined from 51% in the first phase to 46% in the second. In contrast, books with philosophical focus stayed at relatively the same range level, at 9% and 8% in the first and second pha- ses, respectively. Figure 5: The Focus and Topics of Translated Novels Post-Nobel Prize Vs. Post-9/11. Some of the translated subtopics were more popular in the post-Nobel Prize phase, while others started to emerge after 9/11. For instance, topics such as non-urban life in the Arab world were more in fashion during the first phase, representing 10.3% of the books compared to 4.5% after 9/11. In contrast, topics about the literary world of writing and writers started to develop in the second phase and represented 2.4% of the data. Another topic that increased in volume after 9/11 is the Arab world and the West, rising from 2.9% to 8.5%. While the subtopic of patriarchy and women’s oppression was prevalent before 9/11 (14 books), political and economic corruption became the dominant sub-to- pic after 9/11 (38 books). The 9/11 attacks marked the beginning of a period that was full of wars and confrontations between the West and Arab world, which in turn influenced the topics of the books that were translated into English. As such, topics like resistance and torture started to attract more attention, as well as the con- tact between Western and Arab cultures. In addition, after the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, the interest in books about Iraq increased dramatically and more titles AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 68 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 69 about this topic were translated into English. The data also shows that the number of books revolving around topics like rural life, religious extremism and the use of drugs declined after 9/11. With respect to the publishers, Figure 6 shows the percentage of books published on history, culture, and philosophy by the four different types of publishers – acade- mic, commercial, independent, and non-profit. One of the salient differences in pub- lishers is the focus of non-profit publishers on historical books (58% of their overall titles). In contrast, cultural books come first, followed by historical books for the other three types of publishers. In addition, the greater interest of academic publishers in philosophical books is apparent (12% of their overall books) compared to other pub- lishers. Overall, the independent and commercial publishers have similar tendencies and preferences when choosing Arabic books for translation and publishing. Figure 6: The Focus and Topics of Translated Novels by Different Publishers. In terms of topics, the variety and wide range of topics selected by academic publi- shers for translation can be seen in the figure. One of the most interesting results is the high percentage of books that discuss the history of the Islamic and Arab worlds published by non-profit publishers. Such publishers typically target an area of kno- wledge that is important and yet overlooked by others. The Zaidan Foundation is a good example of such a non-profit publisher. Modern period conflicts and confronta- tions, as well as contemporary issues, are the two major topics covered by all publis- hers. With respect to the subtopics prevailing for each type of publisher, political and economic corruption seems to be the most favoured topic by academic and non-profit publishers, whereas patriarchy and cultures in contact are preferred by independent and commercial publishers, respectively. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 69 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 70 5 Discussion and conclusions The purpose of this study was to investigate the flow of Arabic novels translated into English and shed greater light on the main factors taken into consideration during this process, specifically the authors, translators, publishers, and focal topics of these books. The most obvious finding to emerge from the study is the increased Western interest in Arabic culture in general, and Arabic literary books in particular, after 9/11. These attacks greatly affected the Middle East and raised the curiosity of many, what Sinan Antoon, the Iraqi poet and translator, calls “forensic interest”, whereby people think that by reading novels or poetry they will understand politics” (Forbes). This increasing curiosity has indeed influenced the quantity of Arabic books traveling to the West via translation. However, academic publishers and translators still seem to be the most active contributors to the flow of Arabic novels, accounting for almost two-thirds of them. This means that Arabic novels still play a limited role in the Eng- lish-speaking world, and mainly appear in academic settings and serve academic pur- poses. In an attempt to provide an explanation for the clear lack of appreciation of Arabic language and literature in the West, Edward Said, the pioneer of postcolonial studies, argues that the problem rests with the West’s political views about Arabs and their language. Said states that “‘The problem,’ I was told, ‘is that Arabic is a contro- versial language... and consequently dangerous.’” (1990, 278). Another possible explanation for the relative lack of dissemination of Arabic works in other languages lies with Arab institutions. Although Arabic literary prizes have been established to draw attention to translations, they have failed to gain audi- ence interest outside the Arab world. Arabic literature is thus not yet considered as a part of world literature. As the British historian Peter Clark states, it “remains largely known only to Middle East specialists” (2000, 63). In terms of Arab authors, one of the most interesting findings of this study is the high number of male compared to female authors. However, this does not necessarily indicate that male authors are more favoured by publishers, since there is no current published statistical study available that provides data on the number of male and female Arab writers. Therefore, it is hard to reach a clear conclusion based on the cur- rent collected data since there is a possibility that male novelists in the Arab world are actually more numerous than women novelists, which would explain the low number of translated novels written by Arab women. As for the male authors, the data shows that the Egyptian Najeeb Mahfouz is, by far, the most translated male writer, which is obviously justifiable given the fact that Mahfouz was the first Arab author to be awarded the Nobel Prize, and so draw inter- national attention to Arabic literature. On the other hand, the most translated female author is Nawal El Saadawi, also an Egyptian, and one of the pioneering feminists in AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 70 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 71 the Arab world. She is described as “Egypt’s most fiery feminist”, and her controver- sial work has found its way onto the international market, particularly after she was forced to leave Egypt and went to the US. Similarly, a large number of translated Arab authors, for different reasons, were forced to leave the Arab world for the West, which subsequently helped them to be recognized and allowed their novels to be translated and published in English. The differences between male and female authors are further manifested through the focuses and topics of their novels. In general, while male authors mostly focus on historical and philosophical aspects, female authors prefer cultural topics. Further, male authors show a relatively higher tendency to write about political and economic corruption, whereas women’s novels predominantly revolve around issues related to patriarchy and women’s oppression. Needless to say, these findings, although im- portant, do not suggest anything about the selection process and whether or not the translated topics are good representations of those found in Arabic novels, since we do not have sufficient statistical data on the exact topics of such works. However, these findings do fall in line with previous studies that have revealed the distorted image of the Arab world in translated literature, particularly the image of the oppressed woman and the violent and aggressive Other (Kahf, 2010). According to that data, the topic of patriarchy and women’s oppression seems to have been more in fashion before 9/11, particularly for commercial and independent publishers. This finding might indicate that the selection process has been financially driven overall, meaning that the topic of Arab women now appeals to Western readers, since those novels provide a picture that meets their ongoing expectations of the Arab world. After 9/11, the focus shifted significantly toward historical and philosophical no- vels written mostly by male authors and published, for the most part, by academic and non-profit publishers. This important shift, although limited and exclusively promo- ted by these publishers’ educational focus, does indicate a growing interest in gaining more profound knowledge of the Arab world compared to the superficial attempts be- fore 9/11. A typical example of this type of publisher is the Zaidan Foundation, whose mission, according to its website, is to enhance intercultural understanding, starting with an international dissemination of the Arab cultural heritage. In conclusion, the present bibliographical study has been one of the first attempts to thoroughly and systematically examine the flow of Arabic novels into the English- -speaking world. The findings offer important insights into the factors that have con- tributed to the translation of Arabic novels and highlight the role that these translated works play by representing the Arab world to Western readers. Even though this study does provide crucial statistical information about the sta- tus of the translated Arabic novels, the lack of statistical data on the Arabic novels in general does not allow us to provide further precise conclusions regarding the data AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 71 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 72 obtained on the topic. Notwithstanding this limitation, this study is a useful reference for ongoing researchers of translated Arabic literature, and it does raise several useful questions which can be further investigated and explored in any future research. References Abraham, A., An Interview with Nawal el Saadawi, Egypt’s Most Fiery Femi- nist. Vice, 13 November 2015. . Allen, R., The Arabic Novel: An Historical and Critical Introduction. Syracuse, 1995. Allen, R., The Mature Arabic Novel Outside Egypt, in: Modern Arabic Literature (ed. Badawi, M.), Cambridge 1992, p.180–192. Badawi, M., Introduction, in: Modern Arabic Literature (ed. Badawi, M.), Cambridge 1992, p. 180–192. Brewer, R., (ed.) Writers Market 2018: The Most Trusted Guide to Getting Published. Cincinnati 2017. Büchler, A., Guthrie, A., Literary Translation from Arabic into English in the United Kingdom and Ireland, 1990-2010, United Kingdom 2010. Clark, P., Arabic Literature Unveiled: Challenges of Translation. Durham, 2000. Donahaye, J., Three percent? Publishing data and statistics on translated literature in the United Kingdom and Ireland, United Kingdom 2012. Es, N., Heilbron, J., Fiction from the Periphery: How Dutch Writers Enter the Field of English-Language Literature, in: Cultural Sociology 9(3), 2015, p. 296–319. Forbes, M., Iraqi writer Sinan Antoon on his novels about his embattled homeland. The National, 14 May 2015. . Hallard, K., DiDario, K. (eds.), Literary Market Place 2017: The Directory of the American Book Publishing Industry with Industry Indexes. Information Today, Inc., 2016. Kahf, M., Packaging ‘Huda’: Sha’rawi’s Memoirs in the United States Reception Environment, in: Critical Readings in Translation Studies (ed. Baker, M.) New York 2010, p. 28-45. Khalifa, A., Elgindy, A., The Reality of Arabic Fiction Translation into English: A Sociological Approach, International Journal of Society, Culture & Language 2(2), 2014, p. 41–56. Peterson, R., Out of Africa: Lit Mags Related to Africa and Diaspora. The Re- view, 11 May 2013. . Said, E., Embargoed Literature. The Nation, 17 September 1990. AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 72 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 73 The Translation Flow of Arabic Novels into English Over Time Keywords: bibliography, translation archaeology, Arabic-English translation, Arabic novels, translation flow The discipline of Translation Studies has been criticized for being limited to only Euro-American perspectives and cultures, and thus scholars have called for expan- ding the scope of study beyond the Western conceptualizations of translation. This paper attempts to fill that void in the knowledge of the translation archaeology of Arabic novels translated into English. It creates an up-to-date bibliography of Arabic novels translated into English published worldwide across three decades (1988–2018) by consulting the US Library of Congress global union library catalogue and Good- reads. The collected materials are presented across two major historical periods: the post-Nobel Prize phase (1988–August 2001) and the post-9/11 phase (September 2001–2018). The bibliography includes 277 translated Arabic novels. It identifies the main actors involved in the process of translation, namely the authors, translators, and publishers. In addition to the quantitative analysis of this bibliographical data, this study adopts a comprehensive model by Allen (1995) to apply qualitative analysis to identify the topics being selected for translation into English. The study reveals that an increase in the number of translated works does not necessarily correlate with a greater understanding of the source text culture. In fact, increased translation flows can signal a reinforcement of known cultural stereotypes in the target culture. Prevajalski tok arabskih romanov v angleščino skozi čas Ključne besede: bibliografija, prevodna arheologija, arabsko-angleški prevod, arab- ski romani, prevodni tok Prevodoslovje je doživelo kritiko, da se omejuje le na evro-ameriške perspektive in kulture. Zato so novejši prevodoslovci oz. prevodslovke pozvali k razširitvi obsega študija onkraj zahodnih konceptualizacij prevajanja. Ta članek poskuša zapolniti to praznino na področju poznavanja prevodne arheologije arabskih romanov, ki so bili prevedeni v angleščino. Avtorici sta izoblikovali posodobljeno bibliografijo arabskih romanov, prevedenih v angleščino, ki so bili objavljeni po vsem svetu v treh desetle- tjih (1988–2018) s pomočjo globalnega knjižničnega kataloga Kongresne knjižnice ZDA in baze Goodreads. Zbrano gradivo je predstavljeno v dveh velikih zgodovin- skih obdobjih: obdobje po Nobelovi nagradi (1988–avgust 2001) in obdobje po 11. septembru (september 2001–2018). Bibliografija obsega 277 prevedenih arabskih AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 73 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 74 romanov. Avtorici identificirata glavne akterje, ki sodelujejo v procesu prevajanja: avtorje, prevajalce in založnike. Poleg kvantitativne analize bibliografskih podatkov ta študija uporablja Allenov celovit model (1995) za obravnavo kvalitativne analize oz. za identifikacijo tem, ki so bile izbrane za prevod v angleščino. Študija razkriva, da povečanje števila prevedenih del ni nujno povezano z večjim razumevanjem kulture izvirnega besedila. Dejansko lahko povečani prevodni tokovi signalizirajo krepitev znanih kulturnih stereotipov v ciljni kulturi. About the authors Fatima Alblooshi is an Assistant Professor of Translation Studies specializing in Arabic-English Translation at United Arab Emirates University. She holds a PhD in Translation with a focus on literary translation from Kent State University (Uni- ted States). She is currently teaching translation courses for a Bachelor’s degree in Translation Studies. Her academic research interests include corpus-based studies of literary translation, bibliographic studies of translation, and translation history. Email: f.alblooshi@uaeu.ac.ae Alaa Alasfour is an Assistant Professor at Imam Abdulrahman bin Faisal Universi- ty. She obtained her PhD in translation studies from Kent State University in 2021 and her master’s degree in Linguistics from Northeastern Illinois University in 2016. Alaa specializes in English-Arabic translation and her research interests are on corpus- -based studies, literary translation, Quranic and religious translations, and gender and feminism in translation studies. Email: aalasfour@iau.edu.sa O avtoricah Fatima Alblooshi je docentka za prevodoslovje, specializirana za arabsko-angleško prevajanje. Doktorirala je iz prevodoslovja s poudarkom na literarnem prevajanju na državni univerzi Kent v Združenih državah. Trenutno poučuje prevajalske predmete v okviru prvostopenjskega študijskega programu prevajalstva. Njeni akademski raz- iskovalni interesi vključujejo korpusne študije literarnega prevajanja, bibliografske študije prevajanja in zgodovino prevajanja. E-naslov: f.alblooshi@uaeu.ac.ae AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 74 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52 Fatima alblooshi, alaa alasFour / the translation Flow oF arabic novels into english over time 75 Alaa Alasfour je docentka na univerzi Imam Abdulrahman bin Faisal. Leta 2021 je doktorirala iz prevodoslovnih študij na univerzi Kent State University, leta 2016 pa je magistrirala iz jezikoslovja na univerzi Northeastern Illinois. Alaa je specia- lizirana za angleško-arabsko prevajanje, njeni raziskovalni interesi pa so študije, ki temeljijo na korpusih, literarno prevajanje, koranski in verski prevodi ter feminizem in spol v prevodoslovju. E-naslov: aalasfour@iau.edu.sa AH_2023_1_FINAL.indd 75 1. 09. 2023 13:30:52