In Her First Book, Roaa Nizar Writes ‘To All Who Exist’

At the age of only 20, Roaa Nizar Jafar El-Mubarak has recently published her first book, Li Kol Min Fi Alwujud or To All Who Exist, a series of self-help or self-improvement Arabic letters, addressing sadness, happiness, death, god and faith, dreams and goals, and more.

Roaa was born in Khartoum in 1998. She is currently based in Sharjah, UAE pursuing a degree in law in the University of Sharjah. However, her interests deviate to psychology, especially self-help and guidance. With a large following in social media (almost 10,000 on Twitter), she shares videos talking about and sharing tips on how one can help tend to him or herself and optimise their potential, productivity, health and well-being.

The official public book launch of To All Who Exist took place Al Ain Book Fair 2018 in September 2018 in Al Ain, UAE.

500 Words Magazine talks to Roaa Nizar about her first book, To All Who Exist, and being a first-time author.

Tell us a little about yourself and your background.

I grew up in Muscat, Oman and then crossed the border to pursue my career which is law at University of Sharjah. I’m now in my senior year. I’m expected to graduate next fall on May. Throughout my childhood and teenage years, I loved reading books so much. I got this love of reading from my father. He used to read bed stories to me and my sister before bed. But I used to always tell him let me read it to you and my sister instead.

I always felt different in some way. I had these ideas in my head that left me feeling that I’m in my own world. I felt that my wide imagination was appreciated at school by my language teachers. They would always praise my writing assignments. They thought that I had a special way of manipulating words to come up with something interesting to read. Thanks to the encouragement of my family and school teachers, I gained a lot of confidence in my writings and I will always believe that something great is in my future.

Tell us about your book and what inspired it?

My book is a series of letters, consisting of variety of topics such as letters to loved ones and about feelings of sadness, happiness, death, god, dreams and more.

Moreover, what inspired me to write this book are my feelings, dreams and the hard times I went through being away from my family, and most importantly, my imagination. Whenever I got this strong feeling to write even if I’m about to sleep, I just stay awake and write everything down.

You first launched the book at a book fair in the UAE. What was the response to the book like at the book fair?

The book was firstly launched at Al Ain Book Fair 2018. After that, a second book launch took place in Sharjah International Book Fair. I felt that the response I got from Sharjah book fair was better. Because of it being my first time publishing a book, it took time for people to hear about it.

Have you thought about launching it elsewhere especially Sudan? And will you be going on a book tour?

Of course, there will be a book launch in Sudan. The heartwarming part is that I always got the feeling that my book is dedicated to them, the people in my beloved country. However, I don’t have a specific date for the book launch in Sudan yet but most probably mid-December. Regarding the book tour, I don’t think I’ll be doing that until the book gets the biggest impression possible.

How would you describe the response to the book so far, in general?

For someone to publish a book for the first time, it was pretty overwhelming and I did not really expect people to be this excited. The amazing part is that I always got people being excited about the book even more than me.

Walk us through the beginning stages of writing the book. How did you begin putting it together?

I always had the idea of writing books in my mind. I always dreamt of being an author and I used to write since I was a child. However, I started structuring this book in my first year of university. I love the concept of the letters so at first, I decided that my book is going to only consist of letters to my beloved country Sudan, but I stopped, thinking, ‘Why don’t I write letters to everyone?’ It will be like a message to everyone so I started writing a couple of letters. After a while I stopped writing. I felt uninspired and stopped writing for nearly two years. I was only thinking about where will I get the money for the publishing house. But thank god, I managed to raise the amount by myself and I’m proud of myself for not asking my parents for it. At the end, I determined to finish the book in 2018 and that was my resolution for this year. I just want to say that this book is filled with all the feelings in the world. I gave each and every letter it’s time to be written in a specific way.

How important was it for you to publish the book in Arabic and why?

I don’t know how to put it down but writing my book in Arabic is something I see myself good at it. Secondly, Arabic language has a lot of ways of expressing yourself. A poet once wrote a poem about Arabic language and one of the parts of the poems says:

أنا البحر في أحشائه الدر كامن

فهل ساءلوا الغواص عن صدفاتي

In translation: 

I’m the sea that the pearls are hidden in his embrace

So did the divers ask about my seashells?

It gives us indication of what the poet meant of Arabic language and how much of meanings and expressions this language holds.

Have you thought about translating into other languages?

I thought of it, to be honest. And I would very pleased if someone took this opportunity and translated a piece of my mind to the English language for the rest of the world. I’ll be really glad to experience that.

What do you hope to achieve with the book and its message?

I hope it gets to other people the way it got to me and affected me. I feel like whenever I write it’s a whole new level of thinking. The reason behind choosing to write my book in letter forms is for it to reach to specific people personally, because when you send a message or write a letter you intend for it to reach directly to the person or the thing you wrote a letter for.

What advice do you give to people as young as you who aspire to write and publish a book?

Dear youngsters, the only thing you need to know is your inner voice, dreams and goals. Listen to yourself before trying to get any set of advice from anyone else. See if your goal or dream will affect you positively or not. And yes, I do believe in taking advice from older people, and people with experience, but sometimes all you need is yourself to climb the ladder.

Any upcoming projects we should know about? Are you considering writing more books in the future?

So far, I’m just trying to get my degree in law studies and accomplish the goals I set for myself. And definitely, I will not stop writing.

Thank you to everyone who gave me feedback on the book and enthusiastically shared it with others. And I hope people find their selves inside each letter in the book, To All Who Exist, and for everyone to find peace within their selves.

For more information, follow Roaa Nizar on Twitter @r2oya.