{"product_id":"a-bridge-too-soon-elizabeth-claire-saylor-9780815612193","title":"A Bridge Too Soon: ?Afifa Karam and the Arabic Novel in the United States","description":"\u003cp\u003eMore than a century before contemporary debates about Arab American identity, a Lebanese immigrant woman in New York City was championing intercultural dialogue and women's solidarity across cultural divides through the radical medium of the Arabic novel. ?Afifa Karam (1883-1924) not only wrote groundbreaking fiction; she also theorized the novel as a genre that could empower immigrant women readers at a time when the Arabic novel itself had yet to gain acceptance as a legitimate literary form. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eElizabeth Saylor offers the first comprehensive study of Karam's life and work, recovering a pivotal yet overlooked figure in the nahda, the Arabic cultural renaissance. Drawing on Karam's journalism in the New York-based newspaper \u003ci\u003eal-Huda\u003c\/i\u003e and her three published novels, Saylor reveals how this writer, journalist, and translator developed a distinctly gendered theory of fiction while addressing the urgent questions facing Syrian immigrants navigating between Arab and American cultures. Karam's novels--\u003ci\u003eBadi?a wa-Fu?ad, Fatima al-Badawiyya, and Ghadat ?Amshit\u003c\/i\u003e--feature heroines who embody hybrid identities, forge unlikely cross-cultural friendships, and resist patriarchal oppression both in their ancestral homeland and their adopted country. Karam emerges as a bold social critic and literary innovator whose work remains strikingly relevant to contemporary discussions of transnational feminism and cultural hybridity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Elizabeth Claire Saylor\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0815612192\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780815612193\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Syracuse University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 09\/16\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 212\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover","brand":"Elizabeth Claire Saylor","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":48447251677439,"sku":"9780815612193","price":74.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_50313a63-05af-44ed-adc1-97cc911fec9a.jpg?v=1777229861","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/a-bridge-too-soon-elizabeth-claire-saylor-9780815612193","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}