A comprehensive and up-to-date introduction to the winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature. Included is a full biography and systematic analysis of the writer's works.

This is one of the first books in English to explore Arab responses to Western culture and values in modern Arab literature. Through in-depth research El-Enany examines the attitudes as expressed mainly through works of fiction written by Arab authors during the twentieth, and, to a lesser extent, nineteenth century. It constitutes an original addition to the age-old East-West debate, and is particularly relevant to the current discussion on Islam and the West.

Alongside raising highly topical questions about stereotypical ideas concerning Arabs and Muslims in general, the book...

Yusuf Idris was undoubtedly one of Egypt's most talented and versatile writers in the second half of the twentieth century. The first two novellas in this volume, Madam Vienna and The Secret of His Power, come from the peak period in his career, the late 1950s and early 1960s, while New York 80 belongs to his late period, the 1980s. Yet something holds these three works together, despite their different periods and their scattered settings: Vienna, an Egyptian Delta village, and New York. They all deal with a seminal theme in Arabic fiction since its nascent years and until today: the...

First Published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.