This year's Mantua
Festivaletturatura literature festival, a five-day cultural
event taking place from September 6-10, is a window opening on
the Mediterranean, focusing on current events including stories
of war and exile as well as the fundamentalist drift in the
Muslim world.
The 21st edition of the festival will host seminars,
workshops, theme-based events, concerts and shows with writers,
artists and scientists from around the world, with an
undercurrent of stories focusing on those who have lost their
homeland.
One example is Libyan writer Hisham Matar, who will speak
about his forced exile on September 8 at 11:00 a.m. at Palazzo
Ducale.
Matar, a symbolic voice in contemporary Libyan literature,
took refuge with his family in Egypt at nine years old, when his
father Jaballa - a member of the military, a diplomat and a
leader in opposition to the regime - was accused of opposition
to the regime of Muammar Gaddafi.
His father was likely one of the 1,270 political prisoners
killed by Libyan authorities in June 1996 at the Abu Salim
prison in Tripoli.
It's that "likely" that leaves space for hope when Matar
returns to his homeland after 30 years in exile, in an attempt
to find the truth about what happened to the man he calls "the
present-absent".
Another example is Syrian poet Faraj Bayrakdar, one of the
intellectuals of the Syrian diaspora and an opponent of the
Assad regime, who will speak on September 6 at 18:30 at the
Church of San Barnaba.
Fethi Benslama, a Tunisian instructor of psychopathology at
the University of Paris-Diderot, will speak about the
radicalisation of young Muslims on September 6 at 18:30 at the
Convent of Santa Paola.
Author of the book "A Furious Desire for Sacrifice", Benslama
coined the term "supermuslim" to describe "the Muslim who is
obsessed with the idea of not being Muslim enough, convinced of
having lost his roots and needing to find them again,
sacrificing himself as a martyr".
Washington Post journalist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner
Joby Warrick will speak on ISIS, while French political
scientist Olivier Roy will speak about the links between social
dissatisfaction in second and third generation migrants and
radical Islam.
The hopes betrayed by the season of the Arab Springs come
back to the forefront with Tunisian writer Shukri al-Mabkhout,
author of "The Italian" (published in Italy by Edizioni E/O,
2017), who will speak on September 8 at 19:15 at the Palazzo del
Seminario Vescovile.
Illustrator and designer Zeina Abirached will lead the public
through the years of the Lebanese Civil War on September 9 at
11:30 at the University of Mantua Foundation.
Three of the most prominent photojournalists currently on the
world scene will speak on current events through their images.
They are Buhran Ozbilici (September 10, 17:30, University
Aula Magna room), a Turkish journalist with the Associated Press
who received the World Press Photo prize in 2017 with the shot
of the killer of the Russian ambassador in Ankara; Giulio
Piscitelli, the Italian photographer who boarded migrant boats;
and Monika Bulaj, who will show images in the form of a play,
documenting the last places where people from different faiths
still dialogue.
Finally, a meeting between Arab and Western societies,
beginning with the values and rights sanctioned by the
constitutions, will be held by Valerio Onida, together with
Father Iganzio De Francesco from the Community of Monte Sole and
Yassine Lafram, spokesman for the Muslim Community of
Bologna.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
