São Paulo — After three years of negotiations and document exchanges, Grupo Editorial Triz is preparing to release its first book in Arabic at its new address: Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. Triz’s partners have launched Soul Next, which will operate under the Al Ruh (The Soul) imprint, with the primary—though not exclusive—goal of bringing Brazilian authors to the Arab world. The first book in the language is expected to be released by August.
Triz’s partners already have operations outside Brazil under the imprints Estandarte Portugal in Europe and Garabato in Argentina. In Brazil, Triz is home to the Garatuja and Pingue Pongue Educação imprints and counts among its authors playwright and actor Miguel Falabella, as well as singer and songwriter Fernanda Takai. Although they are part of Triz, the imprints based outside Brazil operate under separate companies. The same will apply to the Sharjah publishing house.
The new company was made possible, says executive director Aldrey Queiroz, thanks to the partnership with fellow partners Cláudio Santos and Juliana Farias, who is also Triz’s editorial director. Farias has visited the emirate several times, especially during editions of the Sharjah International Book Fair. Queiroz also maintains a regular presence in the emirate.
Brazil takes part annually in the Sharjah International Book Fair through Brazilian Publishers, a project to promote Brazilian books abroad, run as a partnership between the Brazilian Book Chamber (CBL) and the Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (ApexBrasil).
“Two or three years ago, we decided to take this path,” says Queiroz. “Grupo Editorial Triz is a Brazilian publishing house, but it has a cultural repository and people involved [in the project] who live there [in the UAE]. The company is born Brazilian with Arab roots,” he says, noting that the team is Arab, including professionals from both the editorial and management areas.
Al Ruh will be based in Publishing City, a free zone in the emirate of Sharjah dedicated to the publishing ecosystem, home to publishers, printing companies, warehouses, information technology businesses, e-commerce companies, among others. Sharjah is one of the seven emirates that make up the UAE, alongside Fujairah, Ras Al Khaimah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Dubai, and the capital, Abu Dhabi. Among the emirate’s highlights, in addition to Publishing City, are the book fair and the cultural center House of Wisdom.
“Arab cultural exchange in Brazil is somewhat established—we see publishers doing the work of bringing some [Arab] authors to Brazil. Even if it doesn’t cover all authors, this movement already exists. But the reverse is not true, and that’s why we saw an opportunity to form this partnership, to understand the opportunities and open a fully Arab company under our group’s brand, in order to take Brazilian authors to Arab territories,” Queiroz said.
Arabic, however, will not be the only language of Al Ruh’s releases, says Queiroz. Readers in the UAE and across Arab countries, he notes, read extensively in English—especially children’s books. Hindi, spoken by many immigrants, is also expected to be among the company’s publishing languages, which additionally plans to produce bilingual editions. The books are set to reach 17 countries, in addition to all bookstores across the UAE. Queiroz does not disclose the name of the first Brazilian author to be published by Al Ruh, but says the goal is to bring the author to take part in the book fair as one of the stages of the launch.
An enthusiast of the Arabic language, Queiroz says it is a rich language, with highly specific words that do not always translate into Portuguese. Al Ruh is one such word. “It’s like a singular soul that exists at the boundary between the spiritual and the physical. It’s a soul of spirit, of what we carry within us,” he says. “The name was chosen for evoking intellectual, spiritual, and symbolic depth, aligned with editorial projects of greater cultural density and bridges between nations.”
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Brazilian publishers attend conference in Sharjah
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
