Khairy Shalaby (; January 31, 1938 – 9 September 2011) was an Egyptian novelist and writer. He wrote some 70 books, including twenty novels, critical studies, historical tales, plays and short story collections. Khairy is widely regarded as having written novels âÂÂof the Egyptian street.âÂÂ
Adam Talib, who translated The Hashish Waiter, said of ShalabyâÂÂs prose:
The most enjoyableâÂÂand the most difficultâÂÂquality about KhairyâÂÂs prose is the way he mixes language levels (registers) within a single sentence or paragraph. Khairy doesnâÂÂt go in for the prophetic or philosophical or pompous-sounding stuffâ¦and he really seems to be having a lot of fun when he writes. I guess what IâÂÂm trying to say is that Khairy doesnâÂÂt spend a lot of time looking up from the story. He doesnâÂÂt look over his shoulder like some writers and he doesnâÂÂt spend too much energy worrying about what âÂÂthe criticsâ will say. I havenâÂÂt asked him but IâÂÂm fairly certain heâÂÂs never spent a second thinking about how this might sound when itâÂÂs translated ... In many ways, Arabic novels are still having a conversation with the culture at largeâÂÂtheyâÂÂre very engagedâÂÂand itâÂÂs reflected in this style of novel. Khairy Shalaby is an important artist and also a very good critic, but he doesnâÂÂt go in for that sort of thing. Like Yusuf al-Qa'id, Khairy tries to show that novels donâÂÂt have to be explicitly intellectual, or about intellectuals, to handle important political and social questions in a very sophisticated way.
Honors
Shalaby's The Lodging House won the Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature in 2003. The Lodging House was listed by the Arab Writers Union as one of the âÂÂtop 105â books of the last century. Istasia was longlisted for the 2010 International Prize for Arabic Fiction.
Works
English translated
- The Hashish Waiter
- The Lodging House
- The Time-Travels of the Man Who Sold Pickles and Sweets
References
External links