ArteEast will present From Memoir to Reportage and Back Again: Gazan Writers Salon, to present contemporary writing from Gaza to New York's literary audiences. Through readings of both poetry and prose, the writers will offer a rare glimpse into the diverse emerging and established voices that make up the dynamic literary scene in this city.
Like Darwish's seminal poem Silence for Gaza, we see Palestinian writers of subsequent generations grapple with the personal and communal experiences of Gaza's history of occupation, blockade and war.
From Memoir to Reportage and Back Again: Gazan Writers Salon is presented in collaboration with the Nuyorican Poets Cafe.
ArteEast will present two public programs of the "Gazan Writers Salon" in conjunction with the publication of For Lives Undone: Gaza Summons Its Writers to Speak (Min Hutam al-Hayah: Ghazzah Tastantiq Kuttabaha), the Spring 2012 issue of Shahadat, our popular online literary publication.
This two-part series of literary readings and discussions will present Somaya Al Sousi, Fatena al Ghorrah and Adania Shibli, a dynamic group of Palestinian writers who will showcase Gazan literature to literary and academic audiences in New York.
Palestine has long been a center of literary and cultural production in the Arab world, with individual voices like Mahmoud Darwish's setting a path for the rich contemporary scene exemplified by the Palestine Festival of Literature which is being held in Gaza in May in its fifth edition. ArteEast's "Gazan Writers Salon" Spring 2012 public programs mark the robust cultural production that has emerged from this city's traumatic history and allows audiences to discover observations and documentation of Gaza and Palestine today.
This program has been made possible with generous support from the A.M. Qattan Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and the Center for Palestine Studies at Columbia University.
25 April 2012, 7PM
Nuyorican Poets Cafe
236 E. 3rd St., New York, NY 10009
Participants:
Fatenah al Ghorrah, author of five books of poetry, The Sea is Still Behind Us (Gaza, 2002) and A Very Disturbing Woman Woman (Egypt, 2003);
Adania Shibli, co-editor of the online forum "Narrating Gaza," who will reflect on multi-genre writings from the forum that explore the repercussions of the Gaza War;
Soumaya Al Sousi, poet has produced four poetry collections of her poetry, including The First Sip of the Sea's Chest (1998), Doors (2003), Lonely Alone (2005), and Idea, Void, White in a joint collection with the poet Hala El Sharouf (published by Dar Al-Adab, Beirut, 2005).
