Nashwa Nasreldin

Nashwa Nasreldin is a British Egyptian writer, editor, and translator of Arabic literature into English, born in Kuwait. Her latest translation is Shadow of the Sun by Kuwaiti author Taleb Alrefai, published by Banipal Books in October 2023.  She previously translated the 2014 Sheikh Zayed Book Award-winning novel After Coffee by Abdelrashid Mahmoudi, with her translation (under the name Nashwa Gowenlock) becoming a fiction finalist in the 2019 USA International Book Awards.

Other translations include the collaborative novel by nine refugee writers, Shatila Stories (Peirene Press, 2018), and a co-translation of Samar Yazbek’s memoir, The Crossing: My Journey to the Shattered Heart of Syria (Rider, 2016), and numerous short stories, published variously in journals The Common, Words Without Borders, and ArabLit Quarterly.

A former current affairs documentary producer and journalist, Nashwa has reported on stories from around the Middle East and North Africa. In January 2011 she travelled to Tunisia as the Assistant Producer on the Rageh Omaar Al Jazeera documentary, The Death of Fear, which traced the roots and repercussions of the uprising. During the first year of the Arab uprisings, she was based at the Middle East headquarters of Agence France Presse, covering the breakout of subsequent demonstrations from Syria to Libya.

In a personal documentary, Class of 1990, which broadcast on Al Jazeera English on the 20^th anniversary of the invasion of Kuwait, she reunited with former classmates from the country of her birth, discovering what happened to her friends – and their school – during the war that had separated them.

She holds an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts, USA. Her poems have appeared in a number of literary journals in the UK and further afield. As well as translating and writing poetry, Nashwa writes feature articles and reviews for literary and cultural publications.

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