Bidoun excerpts The Colors of Infamy, throws party.

Bidoun, a magazine of Middle Eastern arts and culture, included an excerpt of Franco-Egyptian writer Albert Cossery’s novel, The Colors of Infamy (forthcoming from New Directions in November), in their latest Cairo focused issue. Bidoun posted the excerpt here.  

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Cossery has had a resurgence of interest in the last few years with new translations of his work (A Splendid Conspiracy and The Jokers) being published by both New Directions and New York Review Books respectively. Cossery’s history with New Directions extends back to the 1940s when New Directions published two of his books (The House of Certain Death and The Lazy Ones) on the recommendation of Henry Miller, a longtime advocate of Cossery’s work. (Read Henry Miller’s essay “The Novels of Albert Cossery” here.)  New York Review Books will publish Proud Beggars also in November.  

(A young Cossery)

You can pick up the issue at the launch party Bidoun is hosting tonight at Artists Space.

The twenty-fifth issue of Bidoun responds to the Egyptian revolution that began on the 25th of January. In April and May, a group of Bidoun editors went to Cairo in order to better understand what happened, and what did not happen, during the eighteen days of revolt and since…. Bidoun 25 is the result – the product of over fifty unique interviews in Arabic and English, along with roundtable discussions, political party platforms, TV transcriptions, overheard dialogue, dreams, tweets, and email forwards. The result is a composite portrait, at once disjointed and revealing, partial but not trivial.  

The launch of Bidoun #25 at Artists Space will bring together friends from the Bidounisphere to reveal, perform, show and tell some of the things discovered in Cairo. An after party will follow.