Hanan Al-Shaykh was born in 1945 in Beirut, Lebanon. She grew up in a conservative part of town called Ras al-naba where she went to a traditional Muslim primary school for girls. Al-Shaykh began writing at a young age and by sixteen had essays published in the newspaper she would eventually work for, al-Nahar. She attended the Ameri-can College for Girls in Cairo, Egypt from 1963 to 1966. After her graduation she worked in television in Beirut and as a journalist for a women’s magazine, Al-Hasna, before landing a job at al-Nahar in 1968. She worked at the newspaper until 1975.
Novels
The Story of Zahra (1986)
Women of Sand & Myrrh (1989)
Beirut Blues (1992)
Only in London (2001)
The Occasional Virgin (2018)
Women of Sand & Myrrh (1989)
Beirut Blues (1992)
Only in London (2001)
The Occasional Virgin (2018)
Collections
I Sweep the Sun Off Rooftops (1994)
Beirut 39 (2010)
One Thousand and One Nights (2011)
Road Stories (2012) (with Abdulrazak Gurnah, Russell Hoban, Deborah Levy, Kamila Shamsie, Iain Sinclair, Ali Smith, Eleanor Thom and Clare Wigfall)
Beirut 39 (2010)
One Thousand and One Nights (2011)
Road Stories (2012) (with Abdulrazak Gurnah, Russell Hoban, Deborah Levy, Kamila Shamsie, Iain Sinclair, Ali Smith, Eleanor Thom and Clare Wigfall)
Picture Books
Novellas
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