<p><em>By Hassan El-Seddiq and Salma Khaled</em></p>
<p>Award-winning comic artist Deena Mohamed celebrated the release of the English version of &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; with a book signing and a discussion, in which she talked about her journey translating her highly-acclaimed debut graphic novel and the obstacles she faced while translating the deep-rooted Egyptian cultural nuances in order to reach English-speaking readers.</p>
<p>After her success with the webcomic series, &ldquo;Qahera&rdquo;, Deena Mohamed's debut novel&nbsp;&ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; was awarded Best Graphic Novel and the Grand Prize of the Cairo Comix Festival in 2017. &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; was originally released in Arabic and split into 3 parts, before getting picked up by the esteemed publishing house, Pantheon Books, which is responsible for publishing many distinguished graphic novels, such as &ldquo;Persepolis&rdquo;, &ldquo;Habibi&rdquo;, and &ldquo;Maus&rdquo;.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; embraces and celebrates the kiosk culture while fusing it with urban fantasy in a whimsical alternate version of Egypt where wishes can be purchased. The story follows 3 individuals from radically different backgrounds: Aziza, Nour, and Shokry, who are only linked by a modest Kiosk where the three of them buy a first-class wish from.</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>The Genesis Of &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;</strong></span></p>
<p>Deena explained that her admiration for the Egyptian kiosk culture was the starting point for &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;, she said, &ldquo;Originally I wanted to write a story about Kiosks, I wanted to draw them actually, more than to write about them, and I wanted to write a story that was more based on fantasy because I have just finished doing a webcomic and the webcomic was very satirical and I wanted to do something that was more of a narrative, more of a longer story. When I started with "Shubeik Lubeik". She added, &ldquo;I wanted to do a kiosk and I wanted it to sell a magical object, and then I thought of a wish, and then I had to think of what kind of a world where you could sell a wish in.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The meticulous world-building of &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; was an easier task for Deena to create, but bringing it all to life was the real challenge, Deena said, &ldquo;I just came up with the world and then I put the rules for it and I came up with the story, it was like in three hours I outlined all of it and then I spent six years drawing it. You always pay for your ideas.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;It was from the beginning I knew that the Kiosk would be the link between the stories.&rdquo; Deena said, &ldquo;When I was coming up with the concept of wishes I was thinking of what people would wish for, so I immediately was thinking about grief, and then I was thinking about happiness, and I was thinking about health, so I already know what the stories are going to be about.&rdquo;</p>
<p><iframe title="Deena Mohamed on Creating Believable Worlds and Her Graphic Novel SHUBEIK LUBEIK" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XMhmilzpQ2w" width="1904" height="768" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>The Expansion Of &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;</strong></span></p>
<p>The first version of &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; which Deena self-published in 2017, went through many changes over the years, with added pages expanding the story, Deena explained that by saying, &ldquo;In terms of editorial, the first part you can kind of see it grow because when I self-published it, it was around 80 pages, and then when I published it with Dar El-Mahrousa after it won the award, it was 120 pages because the award was a residency in France with other comic artists. When I went to France I realized that other comics artists put a lot of effort into their work and I was kind of jealous, and I felt like I could do better, so I decided to go back and add maybe 30-40 pages, and then for the English [version] I added another 20 pages.&rdquo;</p>
<p>She also talked about why the first part was the one that got the most expansion of the three, &ldquo;From the stories&rsquo; perspective, the first part was so hard to reach the final edition for it, but the second and third parts were very planned, so the third part nothing changed in the English [version] because I had already put in my maximum effort for the Arabic [version]. In the second part, there are a few changes in the English [version] but it&rsquo;s also not that significant. So actually I&rsquo;m interested now in the people who have read the Arabic [version], how they feel about the English [version].&ldquo;</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>The Journey Of Publishing &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;</strong></span></p>
<p>Deena talked about her journey of publishing her debut novel, and how strenuous it is to pursue a career in such a niche market &ldquo;You still can&rsquo;t make a living publishing graphic novels, so the only reason I was able to publish &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; in Arabic was because of the translation. I actually sold the translation before I sign the contract with El-Mahrousa in Egypt.&rdquo; Then she added, &ldquo;We have several really amazing Egyptian comic artists here, and they also have to sell translations or get a grant in order to finish [making] graphic novels in Arabic. Some people can draw a page a day, and some people take a week to draw a page, so if you imagine how long it takes to draw a graphic novel, it&rsquo;s a very time-intensive task and it needs a lot of money actually&rdquo;.</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Translating &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; &amp; The Decision To Keep It From Right-To-Left</strong></span></p>
<p>Deena also shared her taxing experience of translating &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;, she said, &ldquo;Translating is really hard because when I was writing the Arabic parts I wasn&rsquo;t thinking about how I would translate it, it was a problem for my future self, so I didn&rsquo;t really consider how difficult it&rsquo;s going to be because they [the characters] speak in lots of different dialects and there&rsquo;s a lot of localized things in it."</p>
<p>The English &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; isn&rsquo;t published like the traditional from-left-to-right English graphic novels, but it&rsquo;s read from right to left just like its Arabic counterpart, Denna talked about what led her to this decision saying, &ldquo;Keeping it right to left for me was important because when I was translating it, I realized that it&rsquo;s always going to feel like a translation, and I liked that.&rdquo; She continued, &ldquo;When I read manga or when I watch something that is subtitled I like the feeling that it&rsquo;s translated. Like no one reads manga and thinks it&rsquo;s originally in English like you know it&rsquo;s originally in Japanese and you can tell it&rsquo;s a translation and you still enjoy it, so I wanted to keep the same feeling, that you know it&rsquo;s a translation but you still enjoy it&rdquo;.</p>
<p>She also talked about how she convinced Pantheon of that decision, &ldquo;I asked Pantheon if we can keep it right to left and they actually didn&rsquo;t mind at all. They kind of care about the production a lot, Pantheon has published a lot of nice looking books, and they&rsquo;ve also published a lot of Japanese hardcover books and they published them from right to left, so it wasn&rsquo;t too difficult to convince them&rdquo;.</p>
<p>However, the most crucial reason for keeping the graphic novel from right to left was the Arabic calligraphy, Deena clarified, &ldquo;The short answer for why I had to keep it from right to left is because the wishes in &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo; are made of Arabic calligraphy, and you can&rsquo;t flip it", she continued, &ldquo;the flow of the story kept stopping at the wishes, so I think that&rsquo;s part of the decision to keep it right-to-left, and I think it made a big difference, even in the way people receive it, it&rsquo;s like a novelty to them.&rdquo;</p>
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<p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CnOlZmcr3wJ/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Deena Mohamed (@itsdeenasaur)</a></p>
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<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>The Difference Between The Reception Of The Arabic &amp; The English Versions</strong></span></p>
<p>When Deena was asked about the difference between the reception of the book in the Eastern and Western cultures, she replied, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve learned through my career so far to stop predicting my audience because I will always think people will receive it in a certain way. I was aware, at least for the Arabic [version], I know what people like about it because it&rsquo;s been 3 parts and we have conversations about it, especially at Cairo Comix I see how people react to it every year, people message me online all the time about what they think of this part or that part. For the Arabic [version], people focus on the story more, they tend to focus on the characters, and the wishes, and the events, in the English [version] there were a lot of discussions about the infographics, so like the world itself.&rdquo;</p>
<p>She also opened up about her worries that English-speaking readers will face some sort of cultural barrier, she said, &ldquo;Before the English version came out I was definitely a little nervous because I was worried that the English-speaking readers wouldn&rsquo;t like it the same way the Egyptian readers would. It shouldn&rsquo;t be a good Egyptian comic; it should just be a good comic.&rdquo; Then she added, &ldquo;That was the part right before it came out, but now it&rsquo;s been out for a while and I know that people who have no experience with Egypt, or people who have no familiarity with the characters or the story still enjoy it, so I feel like in this part it worked out.&rdquo;</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>What&rsquo;s Next For Deena Mohamed After &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;?</strong></span></p>
<p>Finally, Deena talked a little bit about her future plans, and what is the next step after &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;, &ldquo;I think with &ldquo;Shubeik Lubeik&rdquo;, the challenge was just to make it and then to publish it, for the next step, the challenge is to write something that you&rsquo;re proud of to an extent,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s not a measurement of quality, but a measurement of my own skill to be able to do something that is ambitious in a different way.&rdquo;</p>

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