Jalal Barjas

A trained engineer, he worked as a newspaper editor and a journalist and has published in a range of genres, including poetry, short stories, novels, and literary articles.

He studied aeronautical engineering and worked in this field for years before starting with the Jordanian press as an editor in the Al-Anbat newspaper and later as a reporter for al-Dustour.

His hero, Ibrahim al-Warraq, is a newspaper seller who has been forced out of the city centre but decides against suicide after meeting a mysterious woman who shares his desperation.

However, he continues to seek death in other ways.After losing his job and refuge, Ibrahim decides to live with the homeless people in his city and, assuming the identities of the heroes of the novels he has read, he becomes a professional thief who robs banks and the very wealthy, in order to help the abject poor and impose his own form of justice like Robin Hood.

As events unfold, Barjas opens up many surprises for his reader, illustrating through his flawed characters the ruined state and complete emptiness of the world.