RANDA JARRAR

At the end of March, I tried to visit Palestine, but was denied entry at Tel Aviv Airport and sent back to the U.S. You can read about the Whys and Hows here, in this essay.

“When I was 18 and about seven months pregnant, I bumped into a friend of my mother’s at the clinic.”

That’s the beginning of my new Lives essay in this week’s New York Times Magazine. You can read the rest here.

(The essay’s title, “Eighteen & Pregnant,” is not one I chose, and I find it hilarious. I would’ve gone with something, shall we say, not quite so tabloid-happy.)

I just finished reading the graphic memoir Bye Bye Babylon, and loved it. In Maira Kalman-esque pictures, Ziade recreates the lost objects and places of her youth in newly war-torn Beirut, showing us the different military factions, the senseless destruction of buildings, culture, and human life. First, she shows us the bright, bubbly objects of pre-war Beirut:

She then shows the war itself with the same cataloguing impulse, the old bubbling Beirut in the background silently bearing witness:

It’s a gorgeous and heartbreaking book, and a quick read. I’ve heard so many people say they will never understand the Lebanese Civil War. This book does for the Civil War what Persepolis did for Iran’s 1979 revolution. Buy it, or request it for your library.

I’m lucky enough to teach an Arab-American lit class at Fresno State– it’s officially an Arab-American Women’s Fiction class, but I also teach some poetry, comics, and non-fiction, too– and one of the assignments I gave my class was to think about what direction they think Arab-American literature seems to be going, and what direction they think it ought to go. Lots of students felt that it wasn’t their place, as White, Latino/a, or Asian-Americans, to tell Arab-American writers what to write about. But they wrote wonderful short essays anyway, asking Arab-American writers to write more Sci-Fi, less food porn, more literary fiction, less politically-centered narratives, more literature in general. There were lots of great responses, but I wanted to share this particular response from a young student.

A list of my hopes for Arab American literature by Neama Alamri

1. I hope that the future of Arab American writing will grow to include writers with ties in countries of the Gulf. In our course, we have had a limited representation of writers associated with the Arab States of the Persian Gulf.  And this is because these countries are marginalized in the genre of Arab American literature. There are not enough writers representing this region of the world and consequently, this region of the Middle East is the most misunderstood.

2. I hope that the Arab Muslim American hijabi (girl who wears a scarf) will have a narrative, a space for her voice. I hope that her hijab becomes just one aspect of her identity. And I hope she tells the world how it does not hinder her.

3. I hope that the Arab Muslim American girl can have a narrative where her self-fulfillment is not achieved by the abandonment, rebellion, or resistance of her faith, culture and parents. This leads me to number four.

4. I hope that the Arab American Baba will be a really cool guy. Sure, he’s strict. Sure, he doesn’t allow his daughter to date. But in the end, he really is lovable.

5. I hope that Arab Americans can save each other and there will no longer be the White savior.

6. I hope that Arab American text does not make feminism and Islam mutually exclusive.

7. I hope that Arab American female characters will be defined by something other than their sexuality.

8. I hope that Arab American characters find their culture as not just a burden but a blessing. Enough with the conflicted Arab American who must compromise himself. Let’s have whole characters, no more broken identities. No more origin issues! We are AMERICAN, DAMNIT!

9. I hope that Arab American literature can be in an American literature course. I hope that one day an Arab American writer could just be a writer, and not an Arab American writer.

10. I hope that one day I see myself in a story by an Arab American author.

I’ve been back from Turkey for a few weeks now, back in the very un-Turkish landscape of California’s Central Valley. Someone recently at a cocktail party asked me if Istanbul has been informing my writing- it hasn’t, yet, but it has informed my reading. Very much by accident, I picked up, upon my return to the States, a copy of Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, and while reading it, noticed that Woolf knew the geography of Istanbul pretty well in sections where Orlando plays a role as an ambassador to that city. I did some lazy research and discovered that she had visited Istanbul in her twenties and had marveled at its “difference” from London.

To my pleasant surprise, the gender-switch that Orlando undergoes in the novel, from male to female, takes place in Istanbul. I loved this- and wished I’d known about it during the drag party my Istanbul residency gave me, for which all the attendants showed up in drag.

To my chagrin, Woolf, whom I’ve admired as a feminist voice and literary master, resorts in Orlando to orientalism and glorification of the “Eastern” other- see the perfect and wise tribe with whom the female manifestation of Orlando absconds in the nameless Turkish mountains. A bit of research later, I read, for the first time, about the Dreadnought Hoax for which Woolf, along with members of her Bloomsbury circle, dressed up as “Abissinians” — effectively, in brownface– and spoke gibberish and convinced the British Royal Navy to give them a tour of their prized ship (see the photo above).

The hoax triggered a memory for me, from 1989, when, as an eleven year old, I’d been dragged by my family on a cruise down the Nile from Cairo. We were the only Arabs on the ship, and one night, in Luxor, we were asked by the ship’s “art director” if we wanted to participate in a play about the Pharoah Hatshepsut– in keeping with my gender-flipping theme, Hatshepsut was the first female King of Egypt, and ruled for 22 years. My family, always eager to be seen as not-Arab, agreed. On the ship that night, I wore an ancient Egyptian headdress (a cheap, braided wig), kohled my eyes excessively, and wore a wide bangle. In other words, I was a child playing at womanhood; a brown child in brownface.

What do we do when a writer we admire wrongs us? Do we forgive her because she was a product of a time and a place? Do we criticize her? Do we write our own stories as a letter back to her? And what of the larger world, that, like the art director and his Western audience on that ship in Luxor, further others its others? And what of those of us who allow ourselves to be othered?

In Istanbul, I was shocked by my own loneliness. I spent the Summer surrounded by a language I did not understand. When people asked where I was from, I told them- California, by way of Texas, by way of Palestine and Egypt. I thought my Arabness would somehow ingratiate me, but it did not. I remained an outsider, living in a very male, industrial neighborhood, where I was almost exclusively the only woman walking down the street. For the first time in my life, I desired invisibility, or a cloak of maleness to get me by, at least until I reached more diverse and open neighborhoods.

In that sense, I wanted to be my own Orlando. And maybe, for those brief weeks, I was.

I’m taking a break from researching my new book/revising/being ogled by clueless old men and fatphobic women, to say: Hello! Check out how large the cats in Istanbul live:

Also, I went to the Hagia Sophia and saw, for the first time in my life, a stained glass window with Koranic phrases on it. And, there was a hella huge fresco of Mary and Baby Jesus. In a mosque. Trippy.

And, last, I have been going on quite a few foodventures. My favorite things so far include kumpir, baked potatoes stuffed with fries, and deep-fried-and-syrup-glazed donuts.

Back to the desk. Which, incidentally, sometimes looks like this.

They Might Be Giants – Istanbul (Not Constantinople) from They Might Be Giants on Vimeo.

I’m spending my Summer in Istanbul on a fellowship, at a writer’s residency. The residency is in a building where one of the owners gives circus-performance classes.

Needless to say, I’m very excited.

I’d like to spend the next few weeks reading, researching, writing. If I end up only spending time juggling and eating platefuls of baklava, I’ll come home satisfied.

I’m not sure precisely what drew me to Istanbul when I was looking into summer residencies. But I think its rich history, and the fact that it’s the only city that straddles two continents, might have had something to do with it.

I am off to Toronto for the Luminato festival, at which I’ll be presenting with other Beirut39 authors, including Joumana Haddad and Hyam Yared. I’m really looking forward to seeing those foxy, badass women again, and I’m excited to explore Toronto, which I’ve never visited.

If you’re in the area, stop by our panel at the Glenn Gould Studio on Sunday, at 1PM, and then head over to the Jane Mallet theater afterwards (at 4PM) to see the New Yorker panel with Mona El-Tahawy and Hisham Matar.

I’ve also arranged to do a reading at Beit Zatoun, a Palestinian arts space, with some of the wonderful women of Aqsazine. That event will be at 7PM on Saturday. Details here.

I was lucky enough to curate and guest-edit a special fiction issue from the fabulous Guernica Magazine, focusing on stories by Arab-Americans. The issue includes brand-new fiction by Diana Abu-Jaber, Alia Yunis, Laila Halaby, Patricia Sarrafian Ward, and Youmna Chlala. I hope you’ll read and enjoy the stories. Here is a snippet from my intro:

When I first went on the academic job market a few years ago, search committees asked what my dream class to teach would be. Arab-American Fiction, I said. They smiled, then invariably asked, “And which writers would you teach in that class?” I would enthusiastically share a list of names—Diana Abu-Jaber, Rabih Alameddine, Alicia Erian, Mohja Kahf, Patricia Sarrafian Ward, Laila Lalami, Leila Halaby—and, usually, none of the names registered. “Do you teach your own book?” some of them asked. I do not. But I do teach short stories by Grace Paley, ZZ Packer, Alice Munro, Nami Mun, Jane Bowles, Jhumpa Lahiri, and Toni Morrison (well, “Recitatif,” Morrison’s short story, and a damn good one). “Why,” some committees asked me, “do you teach American literature alongside Arab-American fiction?”

“Because,” I would answer, “Arab-American fiction is American literature.”

Which is why I wanted to put this issue together: to showcase some of contemporary American literature’s strongest voices, and spotlight the voices of newer, more up-and-coming authors. Here, one can see that certain themes—both grave and airy-light—preoccupy these writers: Palestine. Body image. War. Sex. Pizza.

Read the rest here.

Heading home in a short while, inspired and fully charged after days of reflection and conversation (and cocktails!) with Arab-American visual artists, poets, graphic novelists, academics, performers, musicians, DJs, editors. Sometimes I forget how much light we shine, and it’s such a warm surprise when I am reminded.