Rotten evidence : reading and writing in an Egyptian prison / Ahmed Naji ; translated by Katharine Halls.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Nājī, Aḥmad, 1985- author.

Contributor:

Halls, Katharine, translator.

McSweeney's (Firm), publisher.

Albert E. Visk, W'28, Memorial Book Fund.

Standardized Title:

Hirz mikamkim. English.

Language:

Arabic

English

Subjects (All):

Nājī, Aḥmad, 1985-.

Nājī, Aḥmad.

Prisons--Egypt--Cairo.

Prisons.

Authorship.

Censorship.

authorship.

Genre:

autobiographies (literary works)

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

263 pages ; 21 cm

Place of Publication:

San Francisco : McSweeney's, [2023]

Language Note:

In English, translated from the Arabic.

Summary:

"In February 2016, Ahmed Naji was sentenced to two years in prison for "violating public modesty," after an excerpt of his novel Using Life reportedly caused a reader to experience heart palpitations. Naji ultimately served ten months of that sentence, in a group cell block in Cairo's Tora Prison. Rotten Evidence is a chronicle of those months. Through Naji's writing, the world of Egyptian prison comes into vivid focus, with its cigarette-based economy, home-made chess sets, and well-groomed fixers. Naji's storytelling is lively and uncompromising, filled with rare insights into both the mundane and grand questions he confronts. How does one secure a steady supply of fresh vegetables without refrigeration? How does one write and revise a novel in a single notebook? Fight boredom? Build a clothes hanger? Negotiate with the chief of intelligence? And, most crucially, how does one make sense of a senseless oppression: finding oneself in prison for the act of writing fiction. Genuine and defiant, this book stands as a testament to the power of the creative mind, in the face of authoritarian censorship."--Front flap of cover.

Notes:

Translation of: Hirz mikamkim.

First published as Hirz mikamkim by Sefsafa Publishing House, Giza, in 2019; second edition by Khan Aljanub, Berlin, in 2021.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Albert E. Visk, W'28, Memorial Book Fund.

ISBN:

9781952119835

1952119839

OCLC:

1368143200