Fawwaz Haddad (born 1947) is a Syrian novelist. He was born in Damascus

Damascus

Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...

 and studied law at Damascus University. He held several jobs before taking up writing full-time. Haddad published his first novel Mosaic, Damascus '39 in 1991. Since then he has written several more, including A Fleeting Scene, The Unfaithful Translator, A Solo Performance on Piano and God's Soldiers. The Unfaithful Translator was nominated for the 2009 Arabic Booker Prize while God's Soldiers was selected for the longlist of the 2011 prize, although it failed to make it on to the eventual shortlist.

Excerpts of Haddad's work have been translated in English and published in Banipal

Banipal

Banipal is an independent literary magazine dedicated to the promotion of contemporary Arab literature through translations in English. It was founded in London in 1998 by Margaret Obank and Samuel Shimon. The magazine is published three times a year...

 magazine. The Princeton

Princeton University

Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

 scholar and translator Max Weiss

Max Weiss (scholar)

Max Weiss is an American scholar and translator, specialising in the culture and history of the Middle East. He studied biology and history at University of California, Berkeley before moving on to Stanford University, where he completed his PhD in modern Middle Eastern history in 2007...

is currently translating Haddad's 2009 novel A Solo Performance on Piano.

Works

• Mosaic, Damascus '39 (1991)
• Teatro 1949 (1994)
• Al-Risala al-Akhira (The Last Letter) (1994)
• Surat al-Rawee (The Image of the Narrator) (1998)
• Al-Walad al-Jahel (The Ignorant Child), (2000)
• Al-Daghina wa al-Hawa (Rancor and Affection) (2001)
• Mersal al-Gharam (The Love Messenger) (2004)
• Mashhad 'Aber (A Fleeting Scene) (2007)
• Al-Mutarjim al-Kha'in (The Unfaithful Translator) (2008)
• Azef Munfared 'ala al-Piano (A Solo Performance on Piano) (2009)
• God's Soldiers (2010)

Reference