Yasmina Jraissati, winner of the 2023 Sharjah Rights Connection Award in the independent professional category, established the RAYA agency in 2004 and has been promoting high quality Arabic literature on the international scene for translation and adaptation rights ever since. In 2020 she joined Storytel, the Sweden based audiobook streaming platform, where she is a catalog manager for MENA and APAC. One of the books she represents, Where the Wind Calls Home by Samar Yazbek, translated by Leri Price and published by World Editions is a finalist to the 2024 National Book Award in translation.
Jraissati spoke with PW about her career and the development of the rights and translation market in the region.
Can you tell us a little about the RAYA agency?
I created RAYA in 2004 while a student in Paris because I felt bridges needed to be built. Apart from Sindbad, Actes Sud, very few publishers acquired translation rights of Arabic works. I was surprised at first, given the historical ties of France with North Africa and the Levant. It turned out to be the case beyond France, in the U.S. and the U.K., Spain, Italy, the Nordics: virtually everywhere, there was very little translation from the Arabic. One of the reasons, I realized, was very simply that people did not have access. Some editors would have friends who could read the language or would know translators who would recommend books from time to time. Editors’ exposure to Arabic literature was very random and sporadic. Also the Arabic book market itself was, and to some important extent still is, very opaque. There are no governmental efforts, for example, to prepare professional booklets introducing the authors and important works in international book fairs. More importantly, there are no regular, reliable, professional publications announcing new releases, or producing bestseller lists — although there is much more now than before, and one needs to mention here the tremendous contribution of ArabLit. Also, at the time, the rights situation was very messy. Most authors were not informed on the conditions of rights ownership. There was no clear awareness of what they were giving up or keeping when they signed publishing contracts. This led to confusing and problematic situations sometimes with foreign publishers, some of whom were as a result reluctant to do business with Arab authors and publishers.
Being from Lebanon, and in the post 9/11 context, I felt the need to make stories by Arab authors travel. I felt there was a major discrepancy between the stories the media focused on, the impression people generally had of the Arab region, and the complex reality of the region itself.
That is why I created RAYA. The agency represents a diverse range of authors from the Arab world, promoting their work to international publishers, and is committed to showcasing the richness and diversity of Arabic literature.
What opportunities and what challenges does the agency face at the moment?
I think the opportunities and challenges are connected. I have long argued that the interest in Arabic literature tends to be linked to geopolitical phenomena. The Arab Spring, the Syrian war, and now the bombing of Gaza: this violence triggers interest.
On one hand, it’s a healthy attitude. It’s a good thing that people want to know more, that editors often feel a responsibility, as producers of content, to offer a broader view of the world to their readers and to make different voices heard. Of course, there is also in some cases a kind of cynical commercial opportunism. Nonetheless, this does offer a platform for Arabic literature. As professionals involved with Arabic books, we need to use it wisely, to try to give literature a chance to reach a wider audience. However, this is a double-edged sword, and what can be a platform that helps the exposure of Arab authors and works can turn into a narrow box from which Arabic literature has a hard time extracting itself. For example, between 2011 and 2018 there was a lot of interest in Syria. Today, very few people are interested in Syrian literature. For a while, everybody wanted Ukrainian authors, and now a lot of editors look for Palestinian authors. In the particular case of Gaza, and because Arabic literature is so deeply tied to the geopolitical sphere in people’s perceptions, differing views on the conflict will also lead some Arab voices to be silenced on the international scene.
Since the beginning of RAYA, my goal has been to showcase literature for literature. I choose to represent works that I feel are worthy of attention in and of themselves, for the quality of the literature they offer, regardless of anything else. This has always been and remains my main challenge.
What impact has winning this award had on your career?
RAYA turns twenty years old this fall of 2024, and getting this kind of recognition after all these years of relentless work was more moving than I thought it would be. The Sharjah Rights Connection Award praised me for “boosting cross-cultural literature and diversifying publishing”, which, given RAYA’s purpose, is very valuable.
I had been shortlisted twice to the London Book Fair Excellence Awards, in 2019 and 2020, and getting the Sharjah Rights Connection Award in 2023 was important in helping consolidate the agency’s reputation, giving it more presence and more visibility. But I think the most notable impact was personal. It made me realize that RAYA had outgrown the personal project it was originally. It rekindled my passion and my drive, it reminded me how much meaning this work had for me, and showed me it had meaning for others. As a result, it made me more pro-active, and more ambitious than I had ever been. I am now for example considering embracing the “cross-cultural” attribute more widely, actively working to find authors in more “remote” Arab countries, and also perhaps taking on board authors from other less represented languages, along with other projects that are different from the ones I was usually involved in.
