Our People Shall Live: Mizna Gathers Suheir Hammad & Mosab Abu Toha in Conversation

Saturday, March 29 10:35-11:50 a.m. PT

Petree Hall C, Los Angeles Convention Center, Level 1

As we mourn the Gazan lives, communities, and infrastructure destroyed by escalating Zionist genocide, Mizna hosts an intergenerational conversation of Palestinian poets: Def Poetry legend Suheir Hammad and acclaimed Gazan poet Mosab Abu Toha. The poets will read new work responding to our ongoing catastrophe and engage in conversation on Palestinian steadfastness, literature’s role in resisting genocide, and our collective futures in and beyond the world of poetry.

Panelist Bios:

Suheir Hammad, Mizna’s first Edward Said Award recipient, is a poet, playwright, and aspiring DJ. Her poetry has been translated into several non-Romance languages and presented in various settings. She is the author of breaking poems, recipient of a 2009 American Book Award and the Arab American Book Award for Poetry. Her other books are ZaatarDiva; Born Palestinian, Born Black; and Drops of This Story. An original writer and performer in the Tony Award–winning Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, Hammad appears in the 2008 Cannes Film Festival Official Selection Salt of This Sea.

Mosab Abu Toha is a Palestinian poet, short story writer, and essayist from Gaza. His first collection of poetry, Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and won the Palestine Book Award, the American Book Award, and the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry. Abu Toha is also the founder of the Edward Said Library in Gaza, which he hopes to rebuild. He recently won an Overseas Press Club Award for his “Letter from Gaza” columns for The New Yorker.