Middle East Readings
with Hassan Blasim and Joumana Haddad
This Sunday (19 July 2009).
13.00. the Bluecoat, Liverpool.
Two trailblazing Arabic writers – Hassan Blasim from Bagdad, and Joumana Haddad from Beirut – read from and discuss their contributions to Madinah: City Stories from the Middle East.
Hassan Blasim was born in Baghdad in 1973. Having fled Iraq in 2004, he currently lives in Finland. As well as director of numerous short films and one Kurdish feature film, Hassan is a poet and short story writer with work published in various magazines, websites and anthologies. He is co-editor of the Arabic literary website www.iraqstory.com. His first full short story collection, The Madman of Freedom Square, is launched by Comma Press this summer.
Joumana Haddad was born in 1970 in Beirut. She is a poet, translator and journalist and head of the cultural pages in the prestigious An Nahar newspaper, as well as administrator of the IPAF Literary Prize (often referred to as the ‘Arab Booker’) and editor-in-chief of Jasad, an Arabic cultural magazine specialising in literature and art of the body. She has published several widely acclaimed poetry collections, including I Did Not Commit Enough Errors, and The Mirrors of Passers By.
Part of the Liverpool Arabic Arts Festival.
Free – booking required (book on www.thebluecoat.org.uk or call 0151 702 5324)