Borders and Secret Doors

How do we deal with borders in an era of globalization? A conversation, with musical contributions and drawings, about the necessity and impossibility of national borders.

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Information

Date and time Saturday 20 January 2018 20:00 tot 20:50 uur
Location Theater aan het Spui - Zaal 1

How do we deal with borders in an era of globalization? Writers Unlimited presents a conversation about the necessity and the impossibility of national borders in an ever-shrinking world.

In his new, contemporary love story Exit West, the successful Pakistani writer Mohsin Hamid describes life in a time of global migration. In the book, nominated for the 2017 Man Booker Prize, a young couple flees violence in their country via secret doors that lead to Greece and other places.

Paul Scheffer, author and professor of European Studies at the universities of Tilburg and Amsterdam, published the esssay De vrijheid van de grens (The border's freedom, 2016) in which he states that an open society can only exist by a certain spatial demarcation.

Ghayath Almadhoun read from his work for this event. The poet, a member of a young and engaged generation of Arabic writers, has a Palestinian-Syrian background and has lived in Sweden since 2008. He was a journalist in Damascus and set up a house of poetry there.

The musical contribution to this program was by The Hague oud-player, composer and music teacher Amer Shanati; visual artist and illustrator Gerda Dendooven made live drawings.

Line-up

Mohsin Hamid

(Lahore, 1971) grew up in the US and Pakistan. He started writing his debut Moth Smoke (2000) during his studies at Harvard. This innovatively written novel, in which an ex-banker becomes addicted to heroin, became a cult hit in India and Pakistan. The international bestseller The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007), about a Pakistani who gives up his top job in the US due to his disappointment with the West, was turned into a film. After his third novel, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia (2013), he wrote Discomfort and Civilization (2014), an autobiographical acount about politics, culture and religion, and Exit West (2017), a novel focused on a refugee couple in love. He also writes essays and opinion pieces in publications such as The Guardian, The New York Times and The International Herald Tribune.
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Paul Scheffer

(1954) worked as a correspondent in Paris and Warsaw before becoming a research assistant at the Wiardi Beckman Foundation. Since 1978 he has written about 200 essays for NRC Handelsblad and Volkskrant newspapers and De Groene Amsterdammer magazine, gaining particular notice in 2000 for The Multicultural Fiasco. In 2007 he published Het land van aankomst (Immigrant Nations), a book that seeks out what really goes on under the surface of multiculturalism. He held the position of Professor of Metropolitan Issues at the University of Amsterdam from 2003 to 2011. Since 2011 he has been professor of European Studies at the Universities of Tilburg and Amsterdam. In 2013 he published Alles doet mee aan de werkelijkheid. Herman de Wolf (1893-1942), his grandfather's biography followed by the essay De grens van de vrijheid (The border's freedom, 2016) in which he states that an open society can only exist by a certain spatial demarcation.
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Hassnae Bouazza

(Morocco, 1973) is a journalist, columnist, translator, researcher and producer. She publishes in various media (including Dutch national daily newspaper NRC and women's magazine Linda); runs her own online magazine for culture lovers, Aicha Qandisha. She compiled a story collection about Arab women, Achter de sluier (Behind the Veil, 1999); 2013 saw the publication of her book Arabieren kijken (Looking at Arabs), about "ordinary" people in the Arab world. She made TV programs for various broadcasters, including the documentary series Seks en de Zonde (Sex and Sin). Together with Michelin-starred chef Soenil Bahadoer, she wrote the culinary books Spicy Chef (2020) and Streetfood (2022). She published two further books in 2022: Een koffer vol citroenen (A Suitcase Full of Lemons), a requiem for and portrait of her mother, and Arbeidsmigranten in Nederland (Migrant Labourers in the Netherlands).
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Ghayath Almadhoun

(Damascus, 1979) published Weg van Damascus (Away from Damascus, 2015), a Dutch language collection of his poems that was for weeks in the top ten of best-selling poetry volumes, followed in 2017 by Ik hier jij daar (Me Here You There), a collection he wrote with poet Anne Vegter. Almadhoun was born in a Palestinian refugee camp, the son of a Palestinian father and a Syrian mother. He studied Arabic literature and worked as a cultural journalist in Damascus, where he also set up a house of poetry. In 2008 he asked for political asylum in Sweden. Two poetry collections were published there, one of them written with Marie Silkeberg, with whom he also created poetry films. His poetry is imbued with feelings of homesickness and the guilt of a young intellectual who left his native country. His work has been translated into many European languages as well as Chinese.
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Amer Shanati

(Syria) is a Palestinian-Syrian oud player, composer, bandleader and music professor. At the first refugee centre he landed in while seeking asylum, he distinguished himself as gifted musician. Since then, he has performed at the Concertgebouw and been heard on the radio. He lives in The Hague, where he founded The Hague Orchestra for Peace, in which musicians from various countries play music and new compositions with the aim of creating bonds. They see music as the perfect means of attaining peace, because people from differing cultures can easily reach one another with it. Shanati wants to expand his message with his Foundation Amer Music for Peace. He studied at the music institute in Homs, Syria, and at The Hague's conservatory. Together with Stefka (Stephanie Ruijsenaars) he created the poetic musical performance Eerst was er Thuis (First there Was Home), in which four musicians seek a lost home.
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Gerda Dendooven

(Kortrijk, Belgium, 1962) won the 2017 Woutertje Pieterse Prize for her picture book Stella. In it, a drowning person is fished out of the sea and taken in by a foster family. She has been teaching graphic design at the Hoger St.-Lucas Institute in Ghent since 1992. Dendooven is famous for and has won many awards for her children's book illustrations. She received the Gouden Penseel (Golden Brush) in 2000 for her work in De verliefde prins (The Prince in Love) by Ron Langenus. She also writes plays and children's books and illustrates adult books and newspaper columns.
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