Siham Nasser: Lebanese Playwright, Fiery Promoter of an Independent Theater, Dies at 69

Forthcoming in Al Jadid

The Lebanese creative community has been losing many of its pillars. The latest sorrowful loss was of Siham Nasser (1950-2019), a Lebanese playwright and academic who passed away late January. This loss coincides, unfortunately, with a consistent decline in financial support and audience attendance of stage theater. In an interview, Nasser expressed her frustration with the state of Lebanese theater: “All of us Arabs, in general, would rather go to the restaurant than the theater. I want to make theater one of our daily and social habits.”

Essays and Features

Marie Colvin: The Real 'Rose in the Desert'

Iconic, Storied Reporter Faithfully Depicted the Human Cost of War, Forthcoming in Al Jadid

As a war reporter, Marie Colvin chased death to expose the reality of war and violence to civilians. She was well-known for her ‘outrageous’ bravery, diving headfirst into killing zones and dangerous situations at the risk of her own life – a streak of daring that, while a common expectation for those in the field, Colvin pushed to the extremes. In the seven years since her death in February 2012 – when the home she was staying in came under mortar attack by Assad forces – several books and films have come forth to honor and give a portrait of her life. Colvin passed away at the age of 56, with the final moments leading to her death a culmination of all she had fought against in her career.

Cultural Briefings

Killing of Famed Iraqi Author of ‘The Jewish Baths’ and ‘The Aging of Baghdad’ Sparks Growing Outrage

By Al Jadid Staff
The assassination of a leading Iraqi novelist and poet in the middle of a street in the holy Shiite city of Karbala on February 2 has sparked outrage inside and outside Iraq, raising speculation that he was the latest victim in the targeted killings of prominent figures that started last summer.
 
Alaa Mashzoub was fatally shot 13 times by two assailants on motorcycles outside his home in the neighborhood of Bab Al Khan. According to Amar Al Massodi, head of Karbala’s Literature Group, a branch of the Iraqi Literature Association of which Mashzoub had been a member, the writer was returning home from a weekly meeting when he was ambushed. On February 3, intellectuals and artists from Karbala staged a sit-in in protest. News media throughout the world continue to report and comment on the writer’s death.
Cultural Briefings

Native Daughter--Now Columbia University Dean--Returns to Lebanon to Design Beirut’s Museum of Arts

By Al Jadid Staff

Lebanese-born architect Amale Andraos and her company, WORKac, have been selected to design the future Beirut Museum of Art. The art museum, whose project had previously been awarded to Paris-based Lebanese architect Hala Wardé in a 2016 competition, will now be built under Andraos, featuring an open-view walkway that transforms the museum’s interior rooms into an “indoor-outdoor” space. The site, owned by Université Saint-Joseph, had marked the Green Line separating Muslim areas from Christian ones during the Lebanese civil war. The design is intended to “break down the barriers of the museum and allow members of the community open views and access,” in the words of Ali Oriaku from The Architect’s Newspaper. Oriaku emphasizes that the ‘“open museum” idea is especially significant when considering the building’s location on a site known for its history of religious segregation and conflict.”

Cultural Briefings

Tunisian Grave Digger Gives Drowned Refugees in Death, the Dignity They Failed to Receive in Life

By Naomi Pham

On a donated plot of land on the outskirts of Zarzis, a cemetery marked by a sign labeled “Cemetery for Unknown” in six languages has become the resting place for hundreds of unidentified bodies. One Tunisian man has devoted himself to giving migrants who died at sea dignity in death. At 52, Chamseddine Marzoug, a former fisherman-turned-gravedigger, has built over 400 graves in the span of a dozen years for migrants who perished at sea in an effort to reach Europe. Coming from Eritrea, Ivory Coast, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Sudan, as well as Tunisia, these migrants often washed ashore with no family to claim their bodies. “They didn’t have any families to care for them,” he was quoted last September in a Washington Post article by Sudarsan Raghavan, continuing, “So I decided to become their family.”

Cultural Briefings

Ancient Classic Expresses Modern Tragedy of Syria’s 'Trojan Women'

By 
Naomi Pham

Amidst the ruins of Troy, Queen Hecuba declares, “Lift up your head from the dust! Heave up from the earth the weight of your misery, you whom the Gods have cursed. Some agonies are beyond telling, and some must be told.” One of the acclaimed works of ancient Greek playwright Euripides tells the tale of Hecuba, Andromache, Cassandra and the other women of fallen Troy, who, after their husbands die in battle, now face being sold into slavery with their families. Although this war assuredly takes place in the past, director Zoe Lafferty’s reworking of the ancient play reveals a haunting similarity with the wars we wage today.

Syrian, Palestinian and Afghan Stage Artists Cross Oceans to Land in Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin

By 
Al Jadid Staff

Despite being so far from their homes, a group of actors and actresses come together at Germany’s Maxim Gorki Theater to present a story near and dear to their hearts. “Winterreise” (or, “Winter Journey”), performed by the “Exil Ensemble,” tells of 24-year-old Syrian actress Kenda Hmeidan’s journey with her fellow six performers as they take a bus tour through Germany during the brittle cold weeks of January. Each an exile from Syria, Palestine, or Afghanistan, these actors have left their home countries in pursuit of their art, all while struggling with the transition from departure to settlement.

Syrian Refugee Drama Troupe Seeks to Heal Traumas

By 
Al Jadid Staff

It is no accident that the "Love Boat" theatrical sea journey ends in Shakespeare's "King Lear," as more and more Syrians die either under assault from Assad and Russian bombs or by drowning, desperately taking to the seas in hopes of escaping genocidal policies.

It is no accident that the "Love Boat" theatrical sea journey ends in Shakespeare's "King Lear," as more and more Syrians die either under assault from Assad and Russian bombs or by drowning, desperately taking to the seas in hopes of escaping genocidal policies.

‘The Morning They Came for Us’: Untold Stories of Syria's Most Vulnerable Victims

By 
Elie Chalala

Ms. Janine di Giovanni, one of Europe’s most respected reporters, chronicles the hardships inflicted upon adults and children alike, telling tales both gruesome and emotional in her new book, “The Morning They Came for Us” (Liveright, 2016). 

 

Ms. Janine di Giovanni, one of Europe’s most respected reporters, chronicles the hardships inflicted upon adults and children alike, telling tales both gruesome and emotional in her new book, “The Morning They Came for Us” (Liveright, 2016). From her visits to Syria in 2012, di Giovanni gathered stories, speaking with a diverse group of people including pro-Assad nuns, regime doctors, and civilian activists...“The Morning They Came for Us” provides rich content that can be difficult to find in daily news coverage alone.

Dreaming at the Crossroads of Cultures: Mirages

By 
Angele Ellis

Issa Makhlouf’s “Mirages” (The Post-Apollo Press, 2015), formerly translated from the Arabic into French in 2004, returns in an English edition translated by Alicia F. Lam.

 
Mirages
By Issa Makhlouf, translated into English by Alicia F. Lam
The Post-Apollo Press, 2015
 
Issa Makhlouf, an expatriate poet, possesses an anthropologist’s eye, a philosopher’s soul, a journalist’s sense of detail – and a heart rooted in the mountains and valleys of Lebanon.

Love and Loss: An Iran-Iraq Story

By 
Bobby Gulshan

For those unaccustomed to witnessing the daily, random bombardments of cities during a bloody conflict like the eight-year Iran-Iraq War, it would be hard to imagine the lives of those who actually endured those experiences.

 
For those unaccustomed to witnessing the daily, random bombardments of cities during a bloody conflict like the eight-year Iran-Iraq War, it would be hard to imagine the lives of those who actually endured those experiences. The novel “A Portal in Space” (Center for Middle Eastern Studies, University of Texas at Austin, 2015), by Mahmoud Saeed, allows readers to feel, share, and interact with the ordinary people living in war-plagued Basra, Iraq. You cannot help but feel connected to the characters as they struggle to cope with their worries, fears, and despair.

Diaspora Arab Women Writers: The Legacy of Shahrazad and Female Infanticide

By 
Nada Ramadan Elnahla

Rather than focus on Arab women’s repression from an observer’s viewpoint, Hanadi al-Samman’s “Anxiety of Erasure: Trauma, Authorship, and the Diaspora in Arab Women's Writings” (Syracuse University Press) instead highlights the accounts of female writers living in diaspora who have contributed productively and creatively through their writings.

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