Jabra I. Jabra, translated and introduced by Adnan Haydar and Roger Allen
Jabra's highly acclaimed novel is a masterful exploration of the post-1948 Arab world, with its frustrations, yearnings for homeland, and struggle for survival. As his characters interact on a ship sailing from Beirut to Europe, Jabra exposes them to the elements of spiritual and physical displacement. Some survive; others do not.
Jabra Jabra (1920-1994) wrote more than fifty works of fiction, poetry, and criticism, many of which are required reading at universities throughout the Arab world. He is also renowned for his Arabic translations of the works of Shakespeare. Jabra was awarded the Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences Distinguished Prize in 1987 for his life’s achievement in art and literature; the Jerusalem Medal for the Creative Arts in 1990; and both the Tunisian Medal of Merit, First Class, and the Thornton Niven Wilder Prize in 1991. Born in Bethlehem and brought up in Jerusalem, he studied in England and the United States and then settled in Baghdad in 1948.
![The Ship [a novel]](/uploads/66fda7a533842.jpg)
