Exploring Arabic Science Fiction with Yasser Abu El Hassab and David Knecht

Last week, I had an online talk about Arabic Science Fiction with my French publisher and translator Davide Knecht and Egyptian hard science fiction author, Yasser Abu El Hassab. During the session, we talked about Arabic Science Fiction in general, why are we passionate about science fiction, and what got us into writing about this genre in the first place. We also talked about the current scene of Arabic Science Fiction and what we’d like to see happening in the future. The session was recorded and you can watch it all, along with all of the other sessions, on Hikaya’s youtube channel.

I stated this during the session, but will iterate it again here. I admire so much the mission of Hikaya. I think it is noble what they are doing, translating non-anglophone science fiction into the French language. I agree with them. It is very important to champion different perspectives of imagining the futures, and bringing other underrepresented cultures into the conversation. I am honored to have my book Paradis Synthetique being the first book to be published by them this year, and I look forward to seeing them grow and succeed in their endeavour. This session comes as part of CONCLUENCES 2024, an online festival for international SFF, curated by Hikaya. You can watch all of the other sessions on their youtube channel. I love how active they are.

I am also so pleased to get to meet Yasser and learn about his passion in hard science fiction (check his youtube channel here). I am always pleased to learn about other fellow Arabic science fiction writers. It makes me happy to see others in the Arab world interested in combining science with fiction. I can’t wait to read his books, especially The Black Moon, which is getting a French translation at the moment, and is set to be released by Hikaya by end of this year. Best of luck for both Yasser and Hikaya.