Yazbek lets the child testify, a review by Mattia Hagberg, for GP, Sweden, October 2017
How do you describe a modern war? How do you put words on the most horrendous? These questions are all over the Syrian author and journalist Samar Yazbek’s novel The Blue Pen.
Trapped in a basement in Damascus, Rima is sitting and writing and drawing. She is a forgotten girl  in Syria’s hell. Nobody knows that she is sitting there waiting to be rescued. 

The women of Syria have to fight not only the Regime, or the Islamist rebels; they have to fight the whole of a patriarchal society, including male revolutionaries. Yazbek collects their stories.

Both fellows of the Sharjah International Book Fair’s professional program in 2016, Prozart Media and Bata Press have acquired rights to Arabic literature to translate into Macedonian.

This is a translation of an article by Gregoire Lemenager for Nouvel Observateur.
The prize for the Best Foreign Book (Meilleur Livre Etranger), the jury of which includes critics and publishers, is awarded on 29 November. There are two awards, one for fiction and one for non-fiction.
In the non-fiction category, the prize was awarded to Samar Yazbek’s The Crossing.

A unique powerful tale from Syria, through the eyes of a girl who cannot stop walking. 

There are 14 titles on the shortlist, and the winner will be announced on October 10th. The Prix Médicis aims at giving recognition to authors whose fame does not match their talent. The prize was awarded to authors such as Jean Echenoz, Philippe Sollers, Sorj Chalandon or Marie Darieussecq in the past.
Earlier in the summer, Samar Yazbek was given the title of”Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres”, or “Knight of literature”, by the French ministry of culture. This title is a sign of recognition of the services Yazbek …