Exile as an opportunity

Munfarid1, CC BY-SA 4.0
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Najat Abed Alsamad 2021
A few reflections on my life, my writings and my two homelands, Syria and Germany
At the beginning

Private
A poem about the search for an inner home and the silence of despair
Macron and the sex thieves: Rumour and disinformation in Africa

Jean-Baptiste Eczet
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Julien Bonhomme
A rumour is circulating in some African countries: the French state is organising penis thefts to offset declining fertility. The rumour, spread by Russian propaganda, has become fake news
This is the time after time

Peter Andreas Hassiepen / Hanser
Colm Tóibín's poetry collection "Vinegar Hill" serves well the reader with a passion for poetry, and reflects man in all his complexity
Risky freedoms

Elena Ternovaja, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
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Dag Johan Haugerud @ Berlinale 2025
With his Oslo trilogy "Love", "Dreams" and "Sex", Dag Johan Haugerud has created a cinematic, literary and sociological marvel that is as intelligent as it is moving
I condemn the night and its hunting dogs

Harold Rivas
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Ronny Ramírez
Explosion of a cry too long stifled - A deep reading of Ronny Ramírez's early poems and the search for the poetic self
Between Eros and Thanatos

Coco Egia / Reprodukt
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Luz
"Zwei weibliche Halbakte" (Two female semi-nudes), Luz's graphic novel, is as moving as it is graphically incisive
I was born a hidden body

Private
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Lamia Makkadam
Excerpts from "The Book of the Body"...
Now here I am, a fool for sure! No wiser than I was before

Francesca Mantovani / Editions Gallimard
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Gilles Kepel
Gilles Kepel, perhaps the most renowned French expert on the Middle East, published an updated edition of his book on the Hamas massacre of over 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023 and its aftermath
Prize, power, invisibility

Private
A gender-sensitive reading of the Arab Booker Prize
Mechanisms of power

Maurine Tric / Lenos
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Fann Attiki
"Cave 72", Fann Attiki's political satire about life and death in Brazzaville is also a disturbing and universally relevant portrait of a society held hostage by populism and dictatorship.
When wisdom puts the world's stupidity in its place

Fancine Medina / Transit
In her coming-of-age novel "The Age of Umbrage", Jessica Zafra creates a gripping portrait of Philippine society under the Marcos regime that is frighteningly contemporary - and also universal
Looking back to the future

WikiCommons
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Representatives of the participating states at the Bandung Conference, April 18-24, 1955 (front left Gamal Abd el Nasser and right Jawaharlal Nehru)
70 years after the Bandung Conference, Jan C. Jansen and Jürgen Ostermann present an updated edition of "Decolonization: The End of Empires" - at a time when a dangerous neo-imperialism is powerfully rearing its head
When America was divided

Brian McConkey
In her historical novel "The Great Divide", Cristina Henríquez weaves a series of smaller stories into a comprehensive picture of the "Panama Canal" project of the last century, which continues to divide the double continent to this day
Goodbye Carmen Karim...

Private
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Manahel Alsahoui
I'm finally free of my pseudonym: A Syrian Writer and Journalist's Story of Surviving and Thriving
Writing while disappearing

Heike Steinweg / Suhrkamp
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Annie Ernaux
Finally in German , "I Remain in Darkness" - and an Annie Ernaux who perhaps wants nothing more and literature that can do everything after all
Shake It Off

Private
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Jenny Ortuoste
A short story from the Philippines
The unique nature of the European Union

Martin Henze
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Ulrich Haltern
Human DNA isn't the only double helix; there are also the EU's interlocking legal systems. Ulrich Haltern gets to the bottom of this in "Entangled States". He provides important insights in challenging times
The age of pleasure

Ricardo Bohórquez
Childhood memories of the coast and a time of imperceptible pleasure.