Huna: A Memoir of Revolution, Prison, and Becoming (Memoir) set for publication on September 1, 2026 by Hogarth / Penguin Random House
Huna is a memoir that grapples, through the lens of a six-year political incarceration journey in Egypt, with what it means to inhabit a space designed to erase you—and insist on being.
“Huna is a reckoning with what it takes—and what it costs—to remain when erased, and with what endures, perhaps more faithfully, beyond hope.”
Abdelrahman ElGendy is an author and translator from Cairo. His memoir, HUNA, is forthcoming in 2026 from Hogarth, Penguin Random House. A winner of the Samir Kassir Press Freedom Award, ElGendy holds an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from the University of Pittsburgh, and his work appears in publications including The Washington Post, Foreign Policy, The Nation, and Guernica. His poetry and prose translations from Arabic appear in Ploughshares, Poetry Northwest, Literary Hub, Words Without Borders, and elsewhere. ElGendy’s work has received awards or fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, the Heinz Foundation, the de Groot Foundation, the Steinbeck Fellowship, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, and the Arab American National Museum.
Visit Gendy’s website: www.abdelrahmanelgendy.com
Find Gendy on Instagram: @abdelrahman_elgendy95