The Yacoubian Building – Alaa Al Aswany

The Yacoubian Building, a once-elegant temple of Art Deco splendor in downtown Cairo, Egypt. Disparate lives converge, careening toward an explosive conclusion. Tragicomic, passionate, frank in its sexuality, and brimming with human compassion.

Author

Alaa Al-Aswany (1957) is an Egyptian writer, and a founding member of the political movement Kefaya. Aswany attended Le Lycée Français in Cairo and received a bachelor’s degree in dental and oral medicine at Cairo University in 1980. He went on to pursue a master’s degree in dentistry at the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1985. He speaks Arabic, English, French and Spanish. He studied Spanish literature in Madrid. He writes a weekly article in Al-Masry Al-Youm on Tuesdays. His articles have been published in leading international newspapers such as The New York Times,Le Monde, El Pais, The Guardian, The Independent, and others. His second novel, The Yacoubian Building, an ironic depiction of modern Egyptian society, has been widely read in Egypt and throughout the Middle East. His literary works have been translated into 31 languages.