Nathalie Handal
Professor of Literature and Creative Writing
Affiliation: NYU Abu Dhabi
Education: MPHIL University of London; MFA Bennington College
Research Areas: Global literature, poetry, flash, literary travel writing, translation, diasporic literatures, Mediterranean crossroads
Nathalie Handal is described as a “contemporary Orpheus.” She has lived in four continents, is the author of 10 award-winning books, translated in over 15 languages, including Life in a Country Album and The Republics, lauded as “one of the most inventive books by one of today’s most diverse writers,” winner of the Virginia Faulkner Award for Excellence in Writing and the Arab American Book Award. She is the editor of two bestselling anthologies, has worked over 20 theatrical productions, and her writings have appeared in Vanity Fair, Guernica, The Guardian, The New York Times, The Nation, and The Irish Times. Handal is the recipient of awards from the PEN Foundation, Lannan Foundation, Fondazione di Venezia, Centro Andaluz de las Letras, Africa Institute, and featured at the United Nations for Outstanding Contributors in literature She writes the literary travel column, “The City and the Writer” for Words without Borders magazine.
Handal has promoted international literature through translation and research. She is the editor of the groundbreaking classic The Poetry of Arab Women: A Contemporary Anthology, winner of the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Book Award, and named one of the top 10 Feminist Books by The Guardian; and co-editor of the W.W. Norton landmark anthology Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry from the Middle East, Asia & Beyond. She has taught, lectured, and given workshops globally, namely at Columbia University, La Sorbonne Paris, Yale-NUS Singapore, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy, and Universitat Leipzig, Germany, among others.