Sahar Khalifeh, born in Nablus in 1941, is an acclaimed Palestinian author. She is hailed as a feminist writer and has written eleven novels, which have been translated into English, French, German, Spanish, and many other languages. She has won numerous international prizes, including the Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature for The Image, the Icon, and the Covenant.

As a young woman, she was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to study in the United States, and holds a Masters in English Literature from the University of North Carolina and a PhD in Women’s Studies and American Literature from Iowa University.

 

Aida Bamia is professor emerita of Arabic language and literature at the University of Florida in Gainesville in the US, where she lives. She is a literary translator and has translated The Inheritance and The Image, the Icon, and the Covenant, among other books.