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SPECIALS – FILM
05.09.13
10.30pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Upper Foyer)
Hala Mohammad’s (Syria) Film »Journey into Memory«
Discussion after the film with film director Hala Mohammad
Hala Mohammad made a documentary on political prisoners in Syria. After a casting, where she saw about 500 prisoners, the Syrian poet and filmmaker chose three actual dissidents who exchange stories of beatings, physical and mental degradation. As all three are writers and intellectuals; they articulate their thoughts painfully well in an otherwise banal setting.
Syria, 2006, 45 min., R: Hala Mohammad, Syrian Arabic with English subtitles
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
06.09.13
7.30pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Side Stage)
Poetry Night II
with Hala Mohammad (Syria), Sergio Raimondi (Argentina) and Tzveta Sofronieva (Bulgaria/Germany) and Ashur Etwebi (Libya)
Presenter: Silke Behl, Speaker: Marina Galic
Ashur Etwebi, born 1952 in Tripoli, is one of the most famous Libyan writers. His poetry is both intimate and impressive, innovative but traditional, influenced by Modernist poetry, yet informal and accessible.
The Syrian poet Hala Mohammad belongs to a generation of modern Arab poets who express their individual experiences as women and intellectuals in the Arab world. Her poems seem spontaneous and reflect first-hand impressions.
The Argentinean Sergio Raimondi repeatedly chooses Bahía Blanca, his home town, as a starting point, but the explorations in his poems go beyond the borders of Argentina and South America.
Tzveta Sofronieva has lived in many parts of the world and currently lives in Berlin, where she works as a freelance author, writing in Bulgarian, German and English.
REFLECTIONS
10.09.13
7.30pm HEINRICH BÖLL FOUNDATION
»Writing Revolution« Literary Writing from the Arab Revolutions.
With Safa Al Ahmad (Saudi Arabia), Yasmine El Rashidi (Egypt), Mohamed Mesrati (Libya), and Nemonie Craven Roderick (GB)
Presenter: Layla Al-Zubaidi
The Anthology »Writing Revolution: The Voices from Tunis to Damascus« is a compilation of poetic reports from people who participated in the profound changes that are shaking the Arab world. Between past, present and future these voices have become a part of an on-going process which is at once hopeful, and tragic. The book was honored in 2013 with the British PEN Prize for outstanding works in translation.
This event will be held in English and will be simultaneously interpreted into German.
Admission free
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
10.09.13
9.00pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Upper Foyer)
Samuel Shimon (Iraq / GB) Reads from his New Novel »Sankhiro’s Adventures«
Presenter: Daniel Medin, Speaker: Jörg Petzold
In his latest novel »Sankhiro’s Adventures«, set in the late 1970s during the Lebanese civil war, Samuel Shimon narrates the story of a young Assyrian Iraqi whom fate leads to join the Palestinian revolution in Beirut. Here his adventures reveal untold stories of death, corruption, love and sex.
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
11.09.13
6.00pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Side Stage)
Margaret Obank (GB) and Samuel Shimon (Iraq / GB) on Arab literature in the West: The journals »Banipal« and »Kikah«
Presenter: Daniel Medin
Since 9/11 it has become clear that in the West there is only a very rudimentary knowledge of the Arab world - particularly in the USA, where less than 3 per cent of all books are translations from other languages. More than three years before 9/11, at the beginning of 1998, the journal, “Banipal”, and later the London-based online journal, “Kikah”, began to attempt to remedy this problem. Editors, Margaret Obank and Samuel Shimon, have now launched a project to reverse the trend: “Kikah” publishes translations of international literary works into Arabic. Its first edition has just been published.
LITERATURE BEHIND BARS
12.09.13
6.00pm TEGEL PRISON
Khalid al-Khamissi (Egypt): Reading and Conversation with prisoners at Tegel Prison
Presenter: Aurelie Winker
Non-Public Event
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
12.09.13
7.00pm COLLEGIUM HUNGARICUM BERLIN
A View of Iraq: Fadhil Al-Azzawi and Hussain Al-Mozany (both Iraq / GER) present their novels
Presenter: Larissa Bender, Speaker: Friedhelm Ptok
The Berlin-based Iraqi authors Hussain Al-Mozany and Fadhil Al-Azzawi present their literary work. They look at Iraq from a distance and debate the recent history of the country. Their stories tell of destruction and inner conflicts, of ideology and despotism.
REFLECTIONS
12.09.13
9.00pm COLLEGIUM HUNGARICUM BERLIN
The Future Prospects of the Middle East. With Fadhil Al-Azzawi and Hussain Al-Mozany (Iraq / GER)
Presenter: Larissa Bender
What is the status of democracy and human rights ten years after the American occupation of Iraq? What follows the fall of the military dictatorship? How can Germany and the Western world react towards the Arab world in times of great change? The Berlin-based Iraqi authors Hussain Al-Mozany and Fadhil Al-Azzawi dedicate themselves to these issues as part of a political-cultural assessment of the current situation in Iraq and other countries in the Middle East.
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
13.09.13
6.00pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Upper Foyer)
Khalid al-Khamissi (Egypt): Escape from Egypt
Presenter: Aurelie Winker, Speaker: Sven Philipp
The author Khalid al-Khamissi, known for his best-selling homage to the taxi drivers of Cairo, has written a new novel, »Noah's Ark«, in which he tells us of Egyptian emigrants. With virtuosity, he interweaves the fates of various people who have left the country, or who want to leave, and portrays a society in which corruption, political repression, and religious and ethnic discrimination are commonplace.
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
13.09.13
7.30pm HAUS DER BERLINER FESTSPIELE (Upper Foyer)
Saud Alsanousi (Kuwait) and Habib Selmi (Tunisia / France) Talk about their new novels
Presenter: Larissa Bender, Speaker: Matthias Scherwenikas
Saud Alsanousi won this year’s International Prize for Arabic Fiction, the most prestigious literary prize in the Arab World, with his novel »The Bamboo Stalk«. The protagonist – the illegitimate son of a Filipino Maid – is in search of recognition by his Kuwaiti father’s family; he is like a rootless stalk of bamboo. Saud Alsanousi’s story alludes to the problems of foreign guest-workers in Arabic countries.
In his latest novel »The Women of al-Bassatîn« (»Nissa'u al-Bassateen«) Habib Selmi deals with a divided Tunisia, caught between the appeal of Europe and the preservation of traditional values. Through the eyes of his protagonist, who lives the life of an immigrant, who exists between two cultures, Selmi takes an outside look at Tunisian society and the changing significance of religion in people's lives
LITERATURES OF THE WORLD
14.09.13
6.00pm COLLEGIUM HUNGARICUM BERLIN
Habib Selmi (Tunisia / France) takes a look at religion in Tunisian society
Presenter: Larissa Bender, Speaker: Jörg Petzold
Taufik, who has been living in Paris for many years, visits his home Tunisia. In Habib Selmi’s novel »Die Frauen von al-Bassatîn« (tr: The Women of al-Bassatîn) Taufik notices changes in Tunisian society, a new religiousness, as well as a suspicion towards the immigrants who seek happiness in Europe.