Hexiefarm cartoon (Photo courtesy of Hexiefarm)

“When the situation is getting tougher, the humor is getting stronger. That has been always the case,” said Xiao Qiang, who runs China Digital Times, a website that follows news and web trends in China. He said in this past year, as Chinese authorities have tried to step up control in the wake of pro-democracy revolutions in the Middle East and Northern Africa, China’s online humor has, if anything, gotten sharper.

“Because especially when it comes to political and social matters, where there’s always a sense of repression there, speaking truth to power requires a lot of courage, and there’s risk involved,” Xiao said. “But humor can smooth that out.”

When two high-speed trains collided last summer, a former journalist named Liu Dongdong took a Chinese rock classic and rewrote the lyrics to create a satirical critique of government mismanagement – of the hi-speed train project, and of the accident.

The song quickly got millions of hits.

“These days in China, people are under a lot of pressure, and sometimes they feel helpless,” said Liu Dongdong. “I hope doing these songs helps relieve some of that pressure – and maybe even gets a little attention from the authorities so they do something about the problems.”

Figuring out what you can say online, and when, is a little like surfing, according to Liu – you catch a wave and ride it in while you can. You get your spoof out before the authorities realize what it is and take it down.

Another satirist who knows that drill goes by the name Crazy Crab. I asked if the authorities know his real name.

“I’m wondering that myself,” Crazy Crab said. “If they don’t know, I’m sure they’re trying to find out.”

Crazy Crab does an online cartoon inspired by George Orwell’s “Animal Farm.” His is called Hexie Farm. Hexie can mean crab, or harmony. The Communist Party’s stated desire is for a “harmonious society” – that is, one without challenge to its rule. Hexie Farm is run by a Party, too, which is trying to usher in a “great, glorious and correct” era of harmony. Crazy Crab considers it a badge of honor that Hexie Farm is now a blocked search term in China. He said China’s leaders don’t really have a sense of humor.

“If they do, I can’t see it,” he said. “Their humor is unintentional; it comes from the absurd contrast between what they say and what they do.”

Xiao Qiang of China Digital Times agrees that the system doesn’t really breed leaders with a sense of humor, or even an individual sense of style. And yet, those leaders ignore political humor at their peril, especially from China’s younger generation. Xiao said they expect more from their leaders.

“They want more freedom, and humor, in the basic sense, is to carry a message,” Xiao said. “That message, in the political humor, is no less than demanding a freer society, a more equal and just society, and pointing to the fact that the power in China today is unaccountable to its own people.”

Yet many of those coming up with snarky satire don’t really believe the system is going to change anytime soon.

Chuanzi (Photo: Mary Kay Magistad)

“I make fun of the difficulties we face in life. We can try to change our lives, but we can’t change the system,” Chuanzi said.

When I asked if he really believes that, he responded, “Well, I’m too small and weak. But if we stick together, musicians and other artists, maybe we can make some change to society.”

Chuanzi’s agent, who was sitting nearby, didn’t like the direction this interview was taking. Artists like Ai Weiwei got arrested for using humor to push for social and political change – although, much more aggressively and persistently than Chuanzi is doing here. The agent cut off the interview, and told me if I want to interview Chuanzi again, I’ll have to submit questions in advance– just like applying to talk to a Chinese government official.

A good satirist could have a field day with this.

Baek Ji-min counts herself as one of Na Ggom Su’s biggest fans. She said she’s addicted to the podcast and can’t wait for the next episode.

“While I am waiting for the new episodes I just repeat the old episodes. When I am bored I listen to the old episodes again and again,” Baek said.

Baek said she loves the show’s sarcasm, much of which is directed at Korea’s president, Lee Myung Bak. He’s is the “petty minded creep” of the show’s title, and the brunt of just about every joke.

The four podcast hosts include a former opposition lawmaker, an investigative journalist, a sound engineer and one of Korea’s first online satirists. All kidding aside, they’re very serious about their political message.

They say President Lee, who they call “his highness,” is only interested in increasing his personal wealth, and that he neglects Korea’s less privileged.

Chung Bong-ju, the host who’s the former opposition politician, said Na Ggom Su gives its fans news they can’t find anywhere else.

“In Korea, the government and big corporations have too much control over the media,” Chung said. “We believe people download our show because they want to hear the truth.”

Chung and the other hosts say Na Ggom Su recently blew the lid on a shady real estate deal involving the President, and it’s cited alleged examples of how Lee and his family are profiting from a new free trade deal with the U-S.

Na Ggom Su’s message of class resentment resonates with many young Koreans who don’t trust the conservatives in power, according to Kim Young-chul, a politics professor at Busan National University.

“Many people feel left out of the political process, and Na Ggom Su has cultivated an image of telling Koreans the truth about politics.”

But Kim said some podcast listeners might not be able to distinguish between the show’s version of truth-telling and rumor-mongering, for instance, when the hosts recently insinuated that President Lee fathered an illegitimate child.

Making accusations like that, even under the guise of satire, won’t protect you from Korea’s strict defamation laws, according to British journalist Mike Breen. Breen was sued for $1 million by Samsung after he made fun of the company in his column for the Korea Times. The charges were later dropped.

But the Na Ggom Su guys have a way of side-stepping responsibility, said Breen.

“They are deliberately throwing out conspiracy theories, but covering themselves by saying this might not be true, but I heard and I’m laughing about it.”

But that tactic isn’t completely fool proof. The four podcast hosts have been indicted on charges of defaming a conservative politician who ran for mayor of Seoul.

And Chung Bong-ju, who faces another defamation suit, had his passport application denied. That meant the hosts had to postpone a planned US tour.

But despite the legal problems, the Na Ggom Su hosts say the jabs at the President will continue, at least until February of 2013.

That’s when Lee Myung Bak’s term in office comes to an end.

Update: On December 22, one of the podcast hosts was sentenced to a year in prison for spreading false rumors. The host – who was once an opposition politician – is also barred from running for office for 10 years. Critics say the sentence is a blow against freedom of speech on the Internet.

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The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Lisa Mullins: In Pakistan, a newly formed band is taking a crack at satire. The band is called Beygairat Brigade or Shameless Brigade and it came up with this song.

[Singing in Urdu]

Mullins: The song is called “Aalu Anday” and it’s satire with a real bite. That’s because Aalu Anday means potato and egg curry though in Pakistan, potato and egg curry is a staple of simple meals. Percussionist Daniyal Malik describes it this way.

Daniyal Malik: It’s like a side food when you don’t have proper food in the meal. That’s what’s cooked at home.

Mullins: Now most Pakistanis prefer chicken. The song is a metaphor for the fact that, from the musician’s point of view, Pakistani institutions serve up the same pablum day after day. Malik and his friend, singer Ali Aftaab Saeed had had enough and they came up with a song “Aalu Anday”. Their YouTube video has received two hundred thousand since last week. Singer Saeed says the point was simple.

Ali Aftaab Saeed: So we really wanted to become a voice of the silent majority which never gets to say what they really want to say out to the audiences and that’s also the content of our song because we have talked issues that are less discussed. Everybody knows about them, everybody have an understanding about them, but when it comes to talking openly about them, that’s where there’s a big gap. We don’t blame politicians too much.

Mullins: Who are you blaming?

Saeed: We are blaming the minority. They are the political analysts who are pro-war and we are going through this phase, the whole economic meltdown, and in these circumstances we’re talking about war and we use satire so that people can digest it more easily.

Mullins: I mean it’s satire and, of course, satire has an edge, but this is, some people would say, kind of bordering on dangerous. One of the things you say is, you point to police corruption in the song. There’s a line that says “Where you kill off every thief, who’s going to check the police’s mischief?” Let’s hear a little of the song.

[Singing in Urdu]

Saeed: See, if we don’t go out of the box in terms of what we’re talking about, then everything else is pretty common. There should be no holy cow. You should discuss things and come to a resolution. We haven’t given any resolution in our song or in our video. We’ve just raised questions and the feedback that we’re getting is very good and we didn’t expect that.

Mullins: The feedback is indeed pretty impressive. I mean it’s been up for just over a week now, the song has on YouTube right? You’ve gotten two hundred thousand hits. Is that correct?

Saeed: That’s right.

Mullins: Amazing. Now, I don’t know if the hits are mostly in Pakistan or not, but I wonder if you think it’s because this is making a strong statement that a lot of people, especially Pakistanis, believe in or in part because it’s so darn provocative in a place where provocation is not welcomed.

Saeed: Actually it started growing from Pakistan. I the first two days there were about sixty thousand views and they were only from Pakistan. After that, the video traveled to India, it traveled to UK, it traveled to Europe, it traveled to USA, and people from Pakistan were the ones who were most interested in the content and if you see the comments on YouTube, we haven’t deleted any. All the nasty comments are there, but then again see the ratio. The nasty comments are not too many.

Mullins: Not too many, but, you know, there’s one thing that you do at the end. You hold up another plaque card and you say, “If you want a bullet through my head, like this song,” meaning “like” it on Facebook. That’s, you know, that’s dodgy.

Saeed: That’s what we initially believed, that we’ll get gunshot after making this video, but we were wrong. We made this video and we are still alive and we’re kicking.

Mullins: That is Pakistani singer Ali Aftaab Saeed and percussionist Daniyal Malik about their provocative political song “Aalu Anday”. This is PRI.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

Some say this vegetarian meal was created by Coptic Christians who could eat it during Lent. True or not, it’s known as the national dish of an Arab country that we’d like you to name. There’s even an online satirical newspaper named after this dish.

Another clue: this northern African country has experienced some big changes in the past six months.

And we are in fact in Egypt which is now dealing with what happens after a revolution. It is still an uncertain time with elections slated to take place sometime in the fall but it’s also a time of greater freedom to speak out. One group that was speaking out even before the revolution were the founders of an Egyptian online satirical newspaper. It’s called El Koshary Today named after that famous Egyptian dish.

The newspaper used to take aim at the government of Hosni Mubarak. Reporter Julia Simon met for a meal of koshary last year with the writers. They all go by pseudonyms. She recently checked in with them again to see how they’re faring in a post-Mubarak Egypt:

At 11 p.m. on a recent weeknight during Ramadan, downtown Cairo feels like a street party. I’m here with Subar Lox, one of the three writers of “El Koshary Today,” Egypt’s first online satirical newspaper. The newspaper is named after koshary, a dish with lentils, fava beans, pasta, tomato sauce, and fried onions. It’s quintessentially Egyptian, and it’s a favorite of Subar Lox and his co-writers, who all use pseudonyms.

On this night, Subar Lox, and another Koshary writer, Makarona, are taking me back to Cairo’s most famous koshary restaurant, Abu Tarek, where I met them last year. But when we arrive, we find that it’s closed for renovation. So we head to another restaurant, Koshary Tahrir, not far away.

It’s also closed. “Koshary is elusive during Ramadan,” Subar Lox said.

We try one more restaurant, Shabrawy. This one is open and Subar Lox asks for koshary but there isn’t any.

“Even though Shabrawy advertises in neon lights ‘koshary good price’ they don’t actually have any koshary,” Makarona said.

“But the cashier said they were planning on having koshary,” said Subar Lox.

“When?”

“Initially.”

“When they made the neon light,” Makarona joked.

With Egypt’s go-to koshary restaurants not serving koshary and an interim military council running the country for now, not much seems reliable in Egypt these days. Even El Koshary Today has become a lot less “today.” Makarona said one reason the writing group has slowed down is they’ve lost their third member, Ward Zeyada. He’s become an activist.

“I think he likes to think he’s busy being a revolutionary right now,” Ward Zeyada said, laughing. “No, he’s just really busy.” He’s so busy that he couldn’t meet with me. In May, Ward Zeyada got arrested for demonstrating and spent four days in jail.

That actually got the other members of El Koshary Today writing again. The result was an article called “How to become a political activist in Egypt.” Suggestions included getting a Twitter account with the word “rebel” in the name, and getting beaten up – but not too much because attractive activists get more media attention.

“We thought, okay, if this is proper satire than we should target both sides,” Makarona said. “We shouldn’t just go for the bad guys.”

In the months since the revolution, the writers of El Koshary Today no longer worry much about directly criticizing the government, even the military. That’s partly because they’re longer alone.

“There’s been this explosion of satire in the country and our little niche has been hijacked by tons and tons of other great voices out there,” Makarona said.

But Hisham Kassem, a prominent Egyptian publisher and commentator, said all this satire isn’t necessarily such a good thing.

“I find a lot of it in very poor taste. You find a lot of it in comedy talk shows and Ramadan programs,” Kassem said. “Frankly I’m not amused.”

Kassem pointed out that El Koshary Today distinguishes itself by its quality. He even posted the “How to become an activist” article on his Facebook page.

“I found it very genuine and innovative.”

The Koshary Today team has been working with a producer to create a TV version, but they wrote the pilot back when Mubarak was still president. Now they are struggling with the re-write. With the country in such a confusing state until the elections, now set for November, Subar Lox said El Koshary – like Egypt itself — is in limbo.

“It is so unclear and so confusing to the extent that I think a lot people don’t even know what’s happening right now. It’s very up in the air.”

One thing is clear, though. The guys at El Koshary Today promise me that after Ramadan, we are going to find that koshary.

• El Koshary Today
• America’s “finest news source”

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This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

MARCO WERMAN:  The Middle East would seem like the wrong place for a satirical newspaper, but that didn’t stop the creators of el Koshary Today.  That’s Egypt’s newest satirical online newspaper.  It’s named after one of the country’s national dishes.  Koshary is made with rice, macaroni, lentils, chick peas, friend onions and tomato sauce.  Reporter Julia Simon went out for koshary in downtown Cairo with the paper’s staff and sent us this report.

JULIA SIMON:  I met the three writers of El Koshary Today, also known as Egypt’s most reliable news source, at Egypt’s most reliable and most famous koshary restaurant, Abou Tarek.

MAKARONA:  The one and only branch in all of Egypt.  On this side of the universe.

WARD ZEYADA:  As it clearly says, we do not have any other branches.

SIMON: Great, so shall we order?

SUBAR LOX:  Yes, let’s do it.

SIMON: Great.  We went upstairs and sat down and immediately the waiter came to take our order.  What did you just ask him?

ZEYADA:  To bring us extra fried onions, my personal favorite and what I represent.

SIMON: That’s Ward Zeyada, but that isn’t his real name.  The writers of El Koshary Today keep their identities hidden using pseudonyms based on different parts of koshary, a dish that includes macaroni, rice, lentils, chick peas, tomato sauce and friend onions.

ZEYADA:  I’m Ward Zeyada, which literally means extra flowers.  That’s what you say when you’re referring to extra fried onions when you order any koshary.

LOX:  I’m Subar Lox.  Subar Lox is super luxury or super deluxe, which is the largest size that you can get in a koshary shop.

MAKARONA:  I’m Makarona, which is pretty self explanatory.  It just refers to the macaroni inside a koshary meal.

SIMON: Less than two minutes after we order our heaping plates of koshary arrived.  Makarona takes a bit.  How is it?

MAKARONA:  Mm.  Sometimes it’s amazing and sometimes it’s unbelievable.

SIMON: Mm, it is good.

MAKARONA:  Today it’s unbelievable.

SIMON: Ward Zeyada, Subar Lox and Makarona are in their mid-twenties.  They met in fourth grade in their private school in Cairo and they each attended college overseas.  When they founded their online satirical paper in October 2009 they decided to call it El Koshary Today, both because koshary is their favorite dish and because, as Subar Lox explains, there’s a deeper significance to the name.

LOX:  Yeah, just a great mix of ingredients and filling and satisfying in a way that other foods are not.  There’s a mix of different articles.  It’s sort of something that satisfied our need to laugh and our need for humor.

SIMON: At the website design company where Ward Zeyada works, they all have day jobs; I asked them why they write in English.  Makarona says it’s partly for the same reason they keep their identities hidden.

MAKARONA:  In Egypt things can be generally quite unpredictable and we felt that at least starting with English you tend to be sort of below the government radar in terms of censorship or whatnot.

SIMON: But writing in English also significantly reduces El Koshary Today’s audience.  In a country where over 20% of the population is illiterate, the only people who read English are Egypt’s small upper class.  Ward Zeyada says that the choice to write for this elite intelligencia was deliberate, as they hold much of the country’s power.

ZEYADA: I’m hopeful the working class would take us forward.  It is still important to have the elite on our side and make them think about things and that will help us also facilitate the revolution one way or the other.

SIMON: The staff of El Koshary Today has a mission.  They use satire to raise awareness of key issues plaguing Egypt, including political tyranny, women’s rights, class divisions, and the horrendous traffic.  Makarona gave me an example of a story he wrote titled “New Law: Egyptian Brides without Hymens to be Returned for a Refund”.

MAKARONA: Because in Egyptian society, the hymen is highly valued, I suppose, in the sense of when you get married you know if your wife is not a virgin.  It’s like uh oh, there’s trouble.  And that article was basically poking fun at that obsession with an organ that really has nothing to do with what a person is.

SIMON: Readers have expressed mixed reviews about articles like that, but with more than 3,200 Facebook fans and up to 1,500 visits a day, the El Koshary Today team feels that their pet project is filling a critical niche in the Egyptian media market.  Entertaining news that knows no boundaries.  Well, except maybe the military.

MAKARONA: You are not allowed by law to talk about the military and so it’s not worth it.

SIMON: Why is it not worth it?

MAKARONA: Because we will be in jail.

LOX: We also hope to continue with the project so we don’t.

ZEYADA: There’s very limited internet access from jail.  So we don’t want to go to jail.

LOX: We don’t know if they have wi-fi there.

ZEYADA: Yeah, I don’t think they have wi-fi, they’re probably still on dial up.  I don’t want to do this.

SIMON: So long as Makarona, Ward Zeyada and Subar Lox have an internet connection, they’ll keep publishing their satirical stories.  And if they get hungry, they have a go to meal.  For The World, I’m Julia Simon, Cairo.

WERMAN: We have a link to the latest issue of El Koshary Today at the world dot org.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

You might expect arguments over street names in Israel/the occupied territories and South Africa: these are places with profoundly traumatic recent histories. But wherever there are streets — or other things to name — there are heated debates over what to call them. Why, some ask, name a new federal government building after Ronald Reagan, a small-government president whose administration tried to prevent such statist expansionism?

Also in this podcast, a conversation with Bob Creson, President and CEO of what appears to be the world’s largest Bible translation organization, Wycliffe Bible Translators USA. According to Wycliffe, about two hundred million people lack access to the Bible in their native tongue. So, with the help of technology and donations, Wycliffe has set itself a deadline: it aims to have at least started translating the Bible into every language by 2025. Nearly all the languages that Wycliffe is currently working on are oral languages only: Wycliffe’s field translators must first design a writing system for any of these languages before committing a translation to paper. So in those cases, the Bible will likely be the first book to appear in that language, and that culture. The act of introducing the written word and an outside religion to a group of people who hitherto knew neither is, depending on how you look at it, freighted with promise or fraught with peril. More on this in future podcasts.

Wycliffe, by the way, is named after 14th century theologian John Wycliffe, who translated parts of the Bible from Latin into Middle English.

Finally, language journalist Michael Erard makes the case for using only artisanal, locally grown and sustainably packaged words. His satirical essay first appeared in web magazine The Morning News. Download MP3

• Video: La Sosta Culturale
• La Sosta Culturale on facebook

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This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

KATY CLARK:  Egypt is becoming an increasingly repressive society, but one Egyptian comedian is using his TV show to shake things up.   Along the way, he’s earning a reputation as “the Egyptian Ali G.”  Correspondent Julia Simon sat down to watch the show with a friend in Cairo and she sent this report.

JULIA SIMON: Kareem Nasser and I are at sitting in an apartment in downtown Cairo, watching scenes from an Egyptian television show that debuted this past August.  It’s called “La Sosta Culturale” and it isn’t your typical Egyptian interview show.

[Audio clip of Egyptian show]

KAREEM NASSER: [(Laughing] Did you ever make out with a woman. And he says, “No you cannot tell me this! You cannot ask me in this way.”

SIMON: This may be relatively tame for an American audience, but for Egyptians, this kind of sexual talk isn’t something you hear on TV every day and it comes from the show’s host.   Does he have a name?

AKRAM AL-SHARKAWY: Yeah, he has a name.  He’s called Martello Rufiano. Martello actually is a hammer, Rufiano is a pimp in Italian. [laughing] But nobody knows about this, huh?

SIMON: That’s Akram al-Sharkawy, talking about his character, Martello Rufiano, the flamboyant Italian host of “La Sosta Culturale.” Rufiano’s a little like Sasha Baron-Cohen’s alter ego, Ali G.  Most of his guests don’t know he is playing a fictional character.  Al-Sharkawy says that playing an Italian makes it easier for him to ask his guests the provocative and sexually charged questions that are normally so taboo in Egyptian society.

AL-SHARKAWY: It helps a little with the guests. You know, they would be shocked but, “Okay, he’s a foreigner. We go with them, yeah?”

SIMON: But while al-Sharkawy jokes about sex, he steers clear of politics.  He shelved an episode that featured an interview with Talaat Sadat, the nephew of the former Egyptian president.  Al-Sharkawy says that Sadat’s harsh attacks on Egypt’s current president, Hosni Mubarak, were too negative for air.   When it comes to attacking the Egyptian government on TV, the repercussions aren’t a joke. Another comedy, the “Hokuma Show,” or “the government show,” was also supposed to debut in August.  That show poked fun at high government officials, including the prime minister, but before it could premiere, the Egyptian Ministry of Information pulled the plug. In Egypt, the political elite are largely untouchable. Sociologist Said Sadek calls it the deification of leaders, turning them into gods like the ancient Egyptian pharaohs.

SAID SADEK: So if you have a comedy show that attacks this aura of glory and immunity around the leader, it is immediately a call for action by the censorship.

SIMON: Egyptians love comedy, and Abeer Solimon believes that comedy has an important role to play in Egypt’s social and political evolution.  She’s program director for the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information.

ABEER SOLIMON: For sure, comedy is one of the biggest channels to talk to the normal Egyptian human in the street because you can write articles, issue books, and release whatever you want but not everybody reads. But everybody watches TV and comedy is finally the easiest way to peoples’ hearts.

SIMON: I asked Solimon to tell me a typical Egyptian joke.

SOLIMON: I can’t!

[Laughter.]

SIMON: You can’t?  You can’t tell it on the air?

SOLIMON: Yeah.

SIMON: So the jokes are pretty political.

SOLIMON: Yeah, yeah, yeah, in a very cynical way.

SIMON:  As the ruling National Democratic Party gathers in Cairo this week, you can expect a lot of political jokes behind closed doors.  For comedians like al-Sharkawy, such political humor will have to stay in the green room.  But others hope that someday these jokes will reach the Egyptian airwaves and help promote the kind of political change only dreamed of in their punch lines.  For The World, I’m Julia Simon in Cairo.

CLARK: We have a link to Martello Rufiano’s show at The  World dot org.  This is PRI.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

I resist the rule that books for the beach have to go down as easy as piña coladas. My eccentric and eclectic list of summer reads is made up of fiction in translation that demands and repays close attention. In addition, I feel that the intrepid group of small or university presses that publish books in translation should be rewarded for their courage. Thus I haven’t included first-rate books from major publishers but highlight offerings from less mainstream presses.

Note that many of the books covered by World Books over the past few months, from “Crossing the Hudson” and “The Foundation Pit” to “The Ninth,”  are worth considering as well.

Feel free to send in other suggestions of worthwhile international fiction, especially those from the smaller publishers.

1) The Halfway House by Guillermo Rosales. Translated by Anna Kushner. New Directions. Rosales destroyed most of his work before he committed suicide in 1993, but the anguished Cuban writer left this short novel, a masterful kick-in-the-teeth. The plot revolves around a man who, after his release from a Miami psychiatric ward, struggles to maintain his sanity in a hellish halfway house. An unconvincing note of sentimentality in the book’s final pages doesn’t dilute the story’s gaunt, gut-wrenching impact.

2) Courtesans and Opium: Romantic Illusions of the Fool of Yangzhou by Anonymous. Translated from the Chinese by Patrick Hanan. Columbia University Press. You want a racy, nineteenth-century epic about sex, sin, drugs, and prostitution set in China? Here it is, a bawdy journey by five brothers through the gaudy brothels of Yangzhou. The novel’s alleged purpose was to serve as a cautionary tale. The book’s sensual gusto overwhelms any taint of moralism.

3) In the United States of Africa by Abourahaman A. Waberi. Translated from the French by David and Nicole Ball. University of Nebraska Press. Waberi, a French-speaking African writer, makes expert use of an acidic satiric set-up worthy of Swift. History has reversed itself: millions flee the poverty of the United States and Europe for the prosperity of Africa. A short, bittersweet, and amusing mediation on multicultural reversals of fortune.

4) The Essential Yusuf Idris: Masterpieces of the Egyptian Short Story by Yusuf Idris. Various translators. Edited by Denys Johnson-Davies. The American University in Cairo Press. Surprisingly, this is the first volume in English that brings together a selection of short stories by one of Egypt’s finest writers (a giant of Arabic literature), rumored to have been on the short list for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Idris’s tales are often straightforward psychological studies of the frustrations and desires of society’s have-nots; the author brings a clear-eyed power to his depictions of individuals grappling with controversial sexual and political issues, from homosexuality to the threat of religious fundamentalism.