Djinns: Fatma Aydemir and Jon Cho-Polizzi in Conversation
When:
Saturday, Oct 26, 2024 3:30p -
4:30p
Saturday, Oct 26, 2024 3:30p -
4:30p
Where:
Goethe-Institut Boston
170 Beacon Street
Boston, MA 02116
Admission:
FREE
Hosted by:
Categories:
Accessible Spots, Lectures & Conferences
Event website:
https://www.goethe.de/ins/us/en/sta/bos/ver.cfm?event_id=25958512
Aydemir’s award-winning novel is a fast-paced, character-driven family saga set in Germany and Türkiye at the end of the 20th century. In the novel, the Turkish-born protagonist, Hüseyin, has spent the past 30 years working in Germany, and his dream of buying his very own flat in Istanbul has finally come true. But he dies of a heart attack the day he moves in. His family in Germany travel to Türkiye for the funeral. In chapters narrated from the perspectives of the individual family members, we learn about each character’s personal djinns (supernatural spirits from Arabic mythology).
The complexity of migration, family, relationships, and life choices is at the center of Djinns. The book invites readers to develop empathy for all the characters.
Fatma Aydemir, born in Karlsruhe, lives in Berlin and works as a journalist, publicist, and editor. Her debut novel, Ellbogen (Elbow), was published by Hanser in 2017 and won the Klaus Michael Kühne Prize and the Franz Hessel Prize for best authorial debut. In 2019, she published the essay collection Eure Heimat ist unser Albtraum (Your Homeland Is Our Nightmare) together with Hengameh Yaghoobifarah. Aydemir is a Guardian columnist and rewrote Goethe’s classic play Faust from a feminist perspective, for Schauspiel Essen.
Jon Cho-Polizzi is a literary translator and assistant professor of German at the University of Michigan. He is co-editor of Fatma Aydemir and Hengameh Yaghoobifarah’s translated essay collection Your Homeland Is Our Nightmare as well as the translator of Sharon Dodua Otoo’s Adas Raum (Ada’s Realm) and Max Czollek’s Desintegriert Euch! (De-Integrate! A Jewish Survival Guide for the 21st Century).
