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Presentation of X, by Kafa’ Al-Zoubi
April 12, 20187:00 p.m.
MADRID
Casa Árabe Ambassadors’ Hall (at Calle Alcalá, 62). First floor.
7:00 p.m.
Free entry until the event’s capacity is reached.
In Spanish and Arabic, with consecutive translation.
The Jordanian writer will be talking about her latest novel, published
by the Verbum publishing firm, at the Casa Árabe headquarters in Madrid
on April 12.
The event will be presented by Pedro Martínez-Avial, the General Director of Casa Árabe.
A writer happens to find the character for the novel she is writing on the streets of Amman, and as of that moment, the author’s obsessive search for her character and the relationship between the two of them through the process of writing the novel, make it possible for readers to get a look at the everyday life of a woman in search of personal freedom and the confrontation both these women have with an oppressive society. X, the unknown variable in any mathematical problem, has suffered since childhood the rules imposed by a position of inferiority within her own family, in which she is forced to accept wearing the hijab and take care of her sick parents, whereas her male brothers move on with their lives as they wish. This subjugation affects everything from her studies to the way she must act in public life, until a series of events lead her to clash in an increasingly outright way with the society in which she is living.
Kafa’ Al-Zoubi, a Jordanian writer, studied engineering in Russia and lived in Saint Petersburg for more than twenty-five years. After that, she returned to Jordan and became a member of both Jordan’s League of Writers and the Engineers’ Union, though she has left that profession to devote herself fully to creative work.
Her literary criticism articles appear regularly in Jordan’s most important newspapers (Al-Ra’y, Al-Arab al-yawm, Al-Dustur) and the Arab world (Al-Quds al-Arabi and Al-Safir). She has completed a wide range of literary studies and translations of Russian literary works into Arabic and had her first novel published in Damascus in the year 2000: Mud Roof, which was followed by Layla, Ice and Ludmila (Beirut, 2007), which was translated into Russian and came out in Moscow in 2009, as well as The Bastard (2012).
A writer happens to find the character for the novel she is writing on the streets of Amman, and as of that moment, the author’s obsessive search for her character and the relationship between the two of them through the process of writing the novel, make it possible for readers to get a look at the everyday life of a woman in search of personal freedom and the confrontation both these women have with an oppressive society. X, the unknown variable in any mathematical problem, has suffered since childhood the rules imposed by a position of inferiority within her own family, in which she is forced to accept wearing the hijab and take care of her sick parents, whereas her male brothers move on with their lives as they wish. This subjugation affects everything from her studies to the way she must act in public life, until a series of events lead her to clash in an increasingly outright way with the society in which she is living.
Kafa’ Al-Zoubi, a Jordanian writer, studied engineering in Russia and lived in Saint Petersburg for more than twenty-five years. After that, she returned to Jordan and became a member of both Jordan’s League of Writers and the Engineers’ Union, though she has left that profession to devote herself fully to creative work.
Her literary criticism articles appear regularly in Jordan’s most important newspapers (Al-Ra’y, Al-Arab al-yawm, Al-Dustur) and the Arab world (Al-Quds al-Arabi and Al-Safir). She has completed a wide range of literary studies and translations of Russian literary works into Arabic and had her first novel published in Damascus in the year 2000: Mud Roof, which was followed by Layla, Ice and Ludmila (Beirut, 2007), which was translated into Russian and came out in Moscow in 2009, as well as The Bastard (2012).
