Cairo, 1963: four years before her lone novel is finally published, the writer Enayat al-Zayyat commits suicide.

Years later, when celebrated Egyptian poet Iman Mersal stumbles upon Enayat's Love and Silence--long since forgotten--Mersal embarks on a journey of reflection and rediscovery, leading her ever closer to the world and work of Enayat al-Zayyat.

In this gorgeously digressive biography, Mersal grapples with the mystery of Enayat's life. Through interviews with family members and friends, Mersal reconstructs the afterlife of Enayat and tracks down the apartments, schools, and sanatoriums where Enayat spent her days. As Mersal maps two simultaneous psychogeographies--from the glamor of golden-age Egyptian cinema to the Cairo of Mersal's own past--a remarkable portrait emerges of two women striving to live on their own terms.

With Traces of Enayat Iman Mersal embraces the reciprocal relationship between a text and its reader, between past and present, between author and subject.