Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp reads from Ahlam Bsharat's TREES FOR THE ABSENTEES (Neem Tree Press, 2019)

By Ahlam Bsharat, translated from Arabic by Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp and Sue Copeland (Neem Tree Press, Sept 2019). Shortlisted for the Global Literature in Libraries Initiative Translated Young Adult Prize 2020

Philistia’s world is that of an ordinary university student, except that in occupied Palestine, and when your father is in indefinite detention, nothing is straightforward.

Philistia is closest to her childhood -- and to her late grandmother and her imprisoned father -- when she’s at her part-time job washing women’s bodies at the ancient Ottoman hammam in Nablus, the West Bank. A midwife and corpse washer in her time, Grandma Zahia taught Philistia the ritual ablutions and the secrets of the body: the secrets of life and death.

On the brink of adulthood, Philistia embarks on a journey through her country’s history – a magical journey, and one of loss and centuries of occupation. As trees are uprooted around her, Philistia searches for a place of refuge, a place where she can plant a memory for the ones she’s lost.

About the author:
Ahlam Bsharat is a Palestinian writer who grew up in a village in
Northern Palestine and completed her MA in Arabic Literature at An-Najah
National University in Nablus. Besides poetry, picture books, short stories,
novels, and memoirs, she has written a number of television and radio scripts. Her books have received many awards and recommendations. Ismee Alharakee Farasha (translated into the English as Code Name: Butterfly) was included in the IBBY Honor List for 2012, a biennial selection of outstanding, recently published books from more than seventy countries. Ismee Alharakee Farasha and Ashjaar lil-Naas al-Ghaa'ibeen, (translated into the English as Trees for the Absentees), were both runners up for the Etisalat Award For Arabic Children's Literature in 2013. Code Name: Butterfly was also shortlisted for the UK based Palestine Book Awards in 2017. Ahlam has been active in numerous cultural forums, has lead creative writing workshops for children and adults and her craft has taken her to Europe as resident artist Dubai


About the translator:
Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp is a literary translator from Arabic, German and Russian into English. She mainly translates children’s books, adult fiction and literary non-fiction, with a particular interest in history.

She has translated novels by Katja Frixe, Kathrin Rohmann, Hanna Winter, Yulia Yakovleva and Fadi Zaghmout, and non-fiction titles by Germany’s best-selling nature writer Peter Wohlleben and cultural historian Ulrich Raulff. She has recently finished a new translation of Wassily Kandinsky’s art manifesto, On the Spiritual in Art. Her translation of Raulff’s Farewell to the Horse was Sunday Times History Book of the Year 2017 and was shortlisted for the 2019 Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator’s Prize.

She has co-translated many books including a YA novel by Ahlam Bsharat, middle grade novels by Pyotr Vlasov, and non-fiction books by Samar Yazbek, Olzhas Suleimenov and historians Ute Daenschel and Kerstin Lücker.

Ruth is a passionate advocate of translated literary fiction and international children’s fiction (#worldkidlit) and helps to coordinate and publicise #WorldKidLitMonth in September. She is the co-editor of three blogs about translated children’s books: World Kid Lit, Russian Kid Lit and ArabKidLitNow!

She is available for online seminars and workshops about children’s literature in translation.

www.ruthahmedzaikemp.com
worldkidlit.wordpress.com
www.arabkidlitnow.com
www.russiankidlit.org
Twitter @ruthahmedzai @worldkidlit
Instagram @bookish_ruth @worldkidlit