fire snakes

The Tale of the Lover Ali bin Mahmoud Al-Qassad

Author's name: Jalal Barjas

A novel by Jordanian poet and novelist Jalal Barjas, which won the Katara Prize for the Arabic Novel 2015, and was published by Katara in 2016. It was then translated into French and English, and will be translated by Katara into Hindi, Chinese, and Spanish. The novel is inspired by the story of a Jordanian academic who, like many others, has suffered from the concepts of social and religious extremism and their impact on society. This is all told through the love story of the novel's character (Ali bin Mahmoud Al-Qassad) for the Bedouin girl (Baria), who tries to seize her freedom in a society that forbids what is forbidden and shames what is shameful. The novel also addresses, within its critical context, the impact of superstition on Arab society, and the impact of this false concept on daily thinking.