They both met in Lebanon at a festival for Lebanese women with successful careers outside of Lebanon and became very attached to each other. It is about the sea and two friends, Huda, a theatre director that lives in Toronto, and Yvonne who owns an advertising company and lives in London. The first section is ‘Imra’ataan ala shati’ el bahr’ (Two Women by the Sea) which was published in 2003. Could you talk to us about your latest novel ‘The Occasional Virgin’ and the characters Huda and Yvonne? What provoked you to write this book? I read that you were inspired by an encounter at Speakers Corner in Hyde Park in London.

Her work has been translated into twenty-eight languages. It was named an Observer Book of the Year. The frank and fearless novel follows the tumultuous lives and sometimes shocking choices of women successful in their careers but unlucky in love. Her latest work, The Occasional Virgin, was published by Bloomsbury in 2018. She has written two plays, Dark Afternoon Tea and Paper Husband and published One Thousand and One Nights, an adaptation of some of the stories from the legendary Alf Layla Wa Layla – the Arabian Nights. Her short stories and novels feature primarily female characters in the face of conservative religious traditions set against the backdrop of political tensions and instability of the Lebanese civil war while examining relationships between the sexes, power struggles and patriarchal control.Īl-Shaykh is the author of the collection I Sweep the Sun off Rooftops and her novels include The Story of Zahra, Women of Sand and Myrrh, Beirut Blues and Only in London, shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, and an acclaimed memoir about her mother’s life, The Locust and the Bird. She was a successful journalist in Beirut, then later lived in Saudi Arabia, before moving to London in 1982. She was born and raised in a conservative part of Beirut called Ras al-naba where she went to a traditional Muslim primary school for girls before moving to Cairo to receive her education at the American College. Hanan al-Shaykh is an award-winning journalist, novelist and playwright, and one of the Arab world's most acclaimed contemporary writers.

The story of zahra by hanan al shaykh