3 December 2024

Academy Dialogue: Adania Shibli and Eva Menasse
Reading and Talk

Welcome: Manos Tsangaris, President of the Akademie der Künste
Wednesday, 11 December 2024, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin

Adania Shibli’s novel Minor Detail intertwines the fates of two Palestinian women: a Bedouin girl who is violated by Israeli soldiers in 1949, and a young woman in the present day who traces details of the girl’s story. Eva Menasse reads passages from Adania Shibli’s novel before the two authors engage in a conversation about the work’s central themes: the limits of narration, and violence and erasure over the course of time in Palestine and beyond. Shibli describes a Palestinian narration – shaped by experiencing Palestine through fragments and ruptures – as an act of dysfluency and “stutter”. Shibli’s novels are characterised by working with anti-narrative structures – cracks that emerge from a literary narrative whose beginning and end are blurred in the linguistic turmoil of decades of political oppression and military occupation.

Adania Shibli, born in 1974 in Palestine, writes novels, plays, short stories and essays. She received the Qattan Young Writer’s Award-Palestine twice: in 2001 for her novel Masaas (Al-Adab, 2002, translated as Touch, Clockroot, 2009) and in 2003 for her novel Kulluna Ba’id bethat al Miqdar aan el-Hub (Al-Adab, 2004, translated as We Are All Equally Far from Love, Clockroot, 2012). Her most recent work is the novel Tafsil Thanawi (Al-Adab, 2017, translated as Minor Detail, Berenberg Verlag, 2022), which was shortlisted for the National Book Award in 2020 and nominated for the International Booker Prize in 2021. In addition to her writing activities, Shibli conducts academic research and teaches at various European universities and at Birzeit University, Palestine (2012–2018).

Eva Menasse, born in 1970 in Vienna, began her career as a journalist before making her literary debut in 2005 with the family novel Vienna. This was followed by novels and short stories (Lässliche Todsünde, 2009; Quasikristalle, 2023; Tiere für Fortgeschrittene, 2017), which have received numerous awards and been translated into numerous languages. Awards (selection): Heinrich-Böll-Preis, Friedrich-Hölderlin-Preis, Jonathan-Swift-Preis, Österreichischer Buchpreis, Bruno-Kreisky-Preis, Jakob-Wassermann-Literaturpreis and the Villa Massimo Rome Prize. Eva Menasse has become increasingly active as an essayist and in 2019 received the Ludwig Börne Prize for her essayistic work. Her most recent novel, Darkenbloom (2021), was a bestseller and has been translated into nine languages.

Event information
Academy Dialogue: Adania Shibli and Eva Menasse
Reading in German, talk in English
Wednesday, 11 December 2024, 7 pm
Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin
Admission: € 7.50/5, free admission for persons under 18
Tickets: ticket@adk.de, tel. 030 20057-1000

Press tickets available at presse@adk.de, tel. 030 200 57-1514