Words Without Borders, an appreciation

Words Without Borders is a grandly ambitious project bringing international writing to American audiences. They publish an online monthly journal homing in on a language or culture or theme somewhere in the world, as well as expansive anthologies and curricula for high school and college students.  This month’s issue is devoted to their new book, Tablet & Pen: Literary Landscapes from the Modern Middle East, edited by Reza Aslan, an émigré Iranian writer who has himself done much to make Muslim realities visible to American readers.  It features stories and poems from Iran, Turkey, and Morocco, and an essay on Arabic literature by Khalil Gibran. Pertinent to our Cultural Center theme, not only does their current issue take us backward and forward in the literature of the Middle East, but September’s issue was devoted to Urdu literature from India.