5 Inspirational Quotes by Strong Female Arab Authors
SOURCE: STEP FEED
BY: RAZAN MNEIMNEH
From starting revolutions to being responsible for the prosperity of humankind, women are definitely a force to be reckoned with.
Day by day, women are realizing their true power and what it means to be in control of their own destiny. This makes it all the more inspiring and encouraging to have award-winning books published by female Arab authors.
Here are five quotes from female Arab authors that are guaranteed to inspire you:
1. “They said, ‘You are a savage and dangerous woman.’ I am speaking the truth. And the truth is savage and dangerous.”
The quote was mentioned in Nawal El Saadawi’s 1975 book titled “Woman at Point Zero,” which is based on her encounter with a female prisoner in Egypt.
Saadawi, who is described as “the Simone de Beauvoir of the Arab World”, is an 86-year-old psychiatrist, physician, writer, and activist with many publications and books on women, Islam, and the intersection of both.
2. “The battles over women’s bodies can be won only by a revolution of the mind.”
Mona Eltahawy is an Egyptian feminist author, public speaker, and journalist most notable for her 2015 book “Headscarves and Hymens“.
In 2012, she published a highly circulated article on misogyny in the Arab world titled “Why Do They Hate Us” in Foreign Policy magazine, which paved her way for writing on the issue.
3. “I don’t want to turn into one of those pathetic creatures who are always homesick, always saying I wish I were still in Beirut. I don’t want to become like you, split between here and there. I know I’m not happy here, but why should I be unhappy in two countries?”
Hanan al-Shaykh examines women’s rights and their challenges in a traditional Middle Eastern structure by addressing taboo subjects like abortion, female infidelity, and the patriarchy.
In her book titled “Beirut Blues“, the Lebanese author tells the story of a young woman unable to grasp the meaning of life as she lives in Beirut, Lebanon, during the civil war.
4. “Baba always used to say that as we age, things change, we become more rigid, and then eventually, most of us, become forgiving again. He called it the cycle of life.”
“Chronicle of a Last Summer: A Novel of Egypt” is a novel set in 1984 in Cairo, Egypt. It follows the three stages – childhood, teenage years, and adulthood – of a young girl surviving the chaos and “claustrophobic routine” around her.
The novel is written by Egyptian writer Yasmine El Rashidi and was long-listed for the 2017 PEN Open Book Award.
5. “It is really hard to be lonely very long in a world of words. Even if you don’t have friends somewhere, you still have language, and it will find you and wrap its little syllables around you and suddenly there will be a story to live in.”
Born to a Palestinian father and an American mother, Naomi Shihab Nye became known as the author who writes about these two worlds.
Nye is a poet, songwriter, and novelist who was named laureate of the 2013 NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature.
She describes “I’ll Ask You Three Times, Are You OK?” as a book of life-altering conversations in long car rides, having spent a “considerable amount of time in cars, both driving and being driven.”
