Betool Khedairi (born 27 November 1965 in
Baghdad,
Iraq) is a novelist born to an
Iraqi father and
Scottish
Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including:
*Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland
*Scottish English
*Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...
mother. She is most known for her
debut novel, ''A Sky So Close'' which has been published in numerous languages such as Arabic, English, Italian, French and Dutch. The novel was first published in Lebanon in 1999 and is often used as the subject of literary critique studies in various international universities.
She received a
BA in
French literature in 1988 from the
University of Mustansiriya
Mustansiriyah University (Arabic: الجامعة المستنصرية) is a university in Baghdad, Iraq.
History
The original Mustansiriya Madrasah was established in 1227 (or 1232/34 A.D. by some accounts) by the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mustansir ...
in
Baghdad, and then she used to divide her time between Iraq, Jordan and the United Kingdom while working in her family's business; in the food industry.
She lived in Iraq until she was 24 and now resides in
Amman
Amman (; ar, عَمَّان, ' ; Ammonite language, Ammonite: 𐤓𐤁𐤕 𐤏𐤌𐤍 ''Rabat ʻAmān'') is the capital and largest city of Jordan, and the country's economic, political, and cultural center. With a population of 4,061,150 a ...
,
Jordan.
Themes
''Absent'' has been described by Susan Comfort
as a novel that features subjective stories about the effects of oil extraction, focusing on gender violence and women's survival, in Iraq during periods of war.
Bibliography
* ''A Sky So Close'' (translated by
Muhayman Jamil)
* ''Absent'' (translated by Muhayman Jamil)
References
External links
Official Site
1965 births
Living people
Iraqi writers
Iraqi women writers
Writers from Baghdad
Iraqi emigrants to the United Kingdom
Al-Mustansiriya University alumni
Iraqi people of British descent
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