The University of Texas Publishing House publishes an English translation of the novel by Omani writer Huda Hamad, “Who Prepares Stairs” for translators Nadine Snow and William Taggart, with another title, “I Saw It in My Dreams” for the translated novel.
The events of the novel “The One Who Counts Stairs” revolve around a woman named “Zahia”, who is known for her strict personality and the frequent complaints of domestic workers who cannot continue working because of her strictness. A third woman first appears in the worker's dream, and then, in a strange way, the unknown woman moves into "bright" dreams. The shared dream brings Zahia and the worker closer together, and the psychological immunity collapses between them, as the story of each of them draws the story of the other and next to the two stories, and there is also a third basic story, which is the story of Zahia’s husband who seeks to write his novel about Zanzibar and his African mother “Be Sora”.
The publishing house says about the novel in its translated version: A powerful novel that deals with personal and systemic violence, a topic that was reviewed through the lens of the relationship between “Zahiya”, a middle-class Omani artist who suffers from anxiety, and “Vanish”, the Ethiopian domestic worker employed by “Zahiya” before That her husband, the novelist, leaves on a research trip to Zanzibar, and the novel moves between multiple and overlapping points of view and stories and explores faithfully – but without exaggeration or self-orientation – the topic of the relationship with Africa.
It is noteworthy that the novel “Who Counts Stairs” was published by Dar Al-Adab in 2014 as part of Najwa Barakat’s professional project to write the novel, and the writer Hoda Hamad published many collections of stories and novels, the latest of which is the novel “They Don’t Mention in Metaphor” also published by Dar Al-Adab in 2022.
Okaz (Jeddah) @OKAZ_online