Borrowed Faces – Issue No. 1
After one year and a half of archival research and work between Beirut, Damascus and Berlin, Fehras Publishing Practices is glad to present you with the first issue of Borrowed Faces, a photo-novel on publishing culture.
The first issue of Borrowed Faces takes you to Beirut in the year 1960. Hala Haddad, a Syrian-American researcher, travels from London to Beirut to find a translator and publisher for her PhD. Arriving at the same moment is Huda Al Wadi, an Iraqi translator coming from Baghdad to work at the Soviet Union Magazine in Beirut. The two young women come across Haifa-born Afaf Samra, owner of Al Sharq bookstore and expert of the city’s cultural life, in the heart of the Hamra district. A new friendship sparks between the three women and is weaved around common interests, exchanges of ideas, love and frivolity. Things become complicated when Hala and Afaf enter a professional relationship with the American Franklin Book Programs and when Huda discovers hidden truths about the Soviet book market. A chain of events unfolds and brings together the three women in an experience rife with contradictions and inner struggles in a cultural environment dominated by patriarchy, and the powers of money and politics.
Available to purchase in our bookshop and online in English and Arabic.