CV

Current Position

Associate Professor of Classical Arabic Literature, Sheikh Hassan Abbas Sharbatly Department of Arab and Islamic Civilizations, The American University in Cairo - since 2022

Previous Employment

Asssociate Professor in Arabic, School of Modern Languages and Cultures, Durham University - from 2017 to 2022

Assistant Professor of Classical Arabic Literature, Sheikh Hassan Abbas Sharbatly Department of Arab and Islamic Civilizations, The American University in Cairo - from 2012 to 2017

Editorial Positions Held

  • Former Co-Editor, Middle Eastern Literatures (2021–2025)
  • Former Associate Editor, Journal of Arabic Literature (2017–2020)

Books

  • How Do You Say “Epigram” in Arabic? Literary History at the Limits of Comparison (Leiden: Brill, 2018)

Edited Volumes

  • The Rude, the Bad, and the Bawdy: Essays in Honour of Geert Jan van Gelder, co-edited with Marlé Hammond and Arie Schippers (Cambridge: Gibb Memorial Trust, 2014)
  • Arabic Literature, 1200–1800: A New Orientation, co-edited with Monica Balda-Tillier. Special Issue of Annales Islamologiques Vol. 49 (Cairo: IFAO, 2016)

Translations

  • Empty Cages by Fatma Qandil (Hoopoe, 2025)
  • The Doves’ Necklace by Raja Alem, co-translated with Katharine Halls (Overlook Press / Duckworth, 2016) — Winner, 2017 Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation
  • Sarmada by Fadi Azzam (Swallow / Interlink, 2011)
  • The Hashish Waiter by Khairy Shalaby (AUC Press, 2011)
  • Cairo Swan Song by Mekkawi Said (AUC Press / Arabia Books, 2011)

Journal Articles

  • “Un-learning the Aesthetics of Malicious Joy”. Al-ʿUṣūr al-Wusṭā 32 (2024), pp. 340–60.
  • “Al-Ṣafadī, his Critics, and the Drag of Philological Time”. Philological Encounters 4:1–2 (2019), pp. 109–34.
  • “A New Source for the Poetry of Ibn Maṭrūḥ (1196–1251)”. Annales Islamologiques 49 (2015), pp. 115–42.
  • “Woven together as though randomly strung: Variation in collections of naevi-poetry compiled by al-Nuwayrī and al-Sarī al-Raffāʾ”. Mamlūk Studies Review 17 (2013), pp. 23–42.
  • “The Many Lives of Arabic Verse: Ibn Nubātah al-Miṣrī mourns more than once”. Journal of Arabic Literature 44:3 (2013), pp. 257–92.
  • “Pseudo-Ṯaʿālibī’s Book of Youths”. Arabica 59:6 (2012), pp. 599–649.

Chapters in Edited Volumes

  • “Qaṣīda poetry: A World Unto Itself” in Christine Chism (ed.), The Wiley Blackwell Companion to World Literature, Vol. 2: 601 ce to 1450 ce. Wiley Blackwell, 2019; abridged version reprinted in Concise Companion to World Literature. Wiley Blackwell, 2024.
  • “Citystruck” in Nizar F. Hermes and Gretchen Head (eds), The City in Arabic Literature: Classical and Modern Perspectives. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2018. pp. 138–64.
  • “Fathers and Husbands” in Joseph E. Lowry and Shawkat M. Toorawa (eds), Arabic Humanities, Islamic Thought: a Festschrift for Everett K. Rowson. Leiden: Brill, 2017. pp. 233–55.
  • “Caricature and obscenity in mujūn poetry and African-American women’s hip-hop” in The Rude, the Bad, and the Bawdy: Essays in honour of Professor Geert Jan van Gelder. Edited by Adam Talib, Marlé Hammond, and Arie Schippers. Gibb Memorial Trust, 2014. pp. 276–98.
  • “Topoi and Topography in the histories of al-Ḥīra” in History and Identity in the Late Antique Near East. Edited by Philip Wood. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. pp. 123–47.
  • “Le Gallienne’s Paraphrase and the limits of translation” in FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám: Popularity and Neglect. Edited by Adrian Poole, Christine van Ruymbeke, William H. Martin, and Sandra Mason. London: Anthem Press, 2011. pp. 175–92. (Repr. 2014).

Education

  • PhD (DPhil), University of Oxford - 2014
  • MA in Arabic Studies, The American University in Cairo - 2008
  • BA in Comparative Literature, UCLA - 2006

DAAD visiting doctoral researcher under the supervision of Prof. Thomas Bauer at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster (2010–2011)

Awards

  • Translation Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts, 2026–2027
  • 2017 Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation (tied for 1st place, Arabic-to-English category)
  • Elected member, Arab-German Young Academy of Sciences and Humanities (AGYA), 2023–2028
  • Maan Z. Madina Visiting Scholar, MESAAS Dept, Columbia University, April 2026.
  • Research Mobility Fellowship, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and Freie Universität Berlin, July–August 2024.
  • Early Career Humanities Scholar, University of Ghana (Legon), Dept of Modern Languages, June–August 2023.
  • Jean Gimbel Lane Global Humanities Scholar-in-Residence, Northwestern University, 6–23 January 2017.
  • Visiting Scholar, Erasmus Plus Program, Freie Universität Berlin, 5–9 December 2016.

External Funding Secured

  • Co-PI and author of $990,000 Grant “Public Humanities for Egypt and the Global South” from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for three-year period (1 September 2017–31 August 2020)
  • Co-PI and author of $35,000 Officer’s Grant from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for the 12-month period (1 November 2016–31 October 2017)

Research Interests

  • Pre-modern Islamicate literatures (Arabic, Persian, Ottoman Turkish)
  • Comparative literature and world literature
  • Literary history and philology
  • Literary translation (Arabic to English)
  • Representations of sexual violence in pre-modern literature