Mama’s Kitchen
A writer looks back on formative memories of her mother and grandmother in the kitchen and wonders about the value of women’s work — and whether love’s labor is ever truly lost.
Centerpiece
Love and Resistance in Online Persian Dating Shows
From blindfolding potential dates to threating them with cockroaches, Iranian YouTube dating game shows go viral and the regime takes action.
Ravaged by Fire
Francisco Letelier connects the devastation of fire and climate change with the decimation of Gaza, and other disasters over time.
“Not a Picture, a Precise Kick”—metafiction
A writer from Cairo imagines a chance encounter between two writers in Prague enamored of Kafka.
“Habib”—a story by Ghassan Ghassan
A bombing in Gaza destroys an entire family except for the protagonist of the short story and his beloved dog.
Khaled Jarrar: Artist At Work
Jenin artist Khaled Jarrar deploys photography, video, installations, films and performative interventions to explore contemporary power dynamics and how they affect everyday people.
Mohammad Hafez Ragab: Upsetting the Guards of Cairo
Maha Al Aswad sheds light on Egyptian writer Mohammad Hafez Ragab, a literary figure of the 1960s whose works have been vastly overlooked.
Dare Not Speak—a One-Act Play
A stage director declines producing a play about a child tragically murdered during a genocide, fearing she may appear biased.
Memory Archive: Between Remembering and Forgetting
Mai Al-Nakib explores memory, forgetting, and writing through the lenses of Woolf, Proust, and a Wim Wenders film.
Al-Thakla—Arabic as the Original Mourner
Abdelrahman ElGendy asks, how do you hold your grief in a language that's been its main perpetrator?
Lithium Dreams, Crisis of the Anthropocene
Artist and writer Francisco Letelier ponders the earth and the future of his native Chile as it debates lithium mining.
Immigrants in Houston: Fiction From Anis Shivani’s Patel Mart
Novelist Anis Shivani has lived in Houston for more than a decade and sets his upcoming novel amongst its immigrant community.
Broken Home: Britain in the Time of Migration
Malu Halasa tells the story of refugees seeking asylum in Britain who brave the dangerous waters of the English Channel.
Iraqi Diaspora Playwrights Hassan Abdulrazzak & Jasmine Naziha Jones: Use Your Anger as Fuel
Sparks fly when two UK-based Iraqi diaspora playwrights discuss how the art of theatre addresses Iraqi pain with both comedy and drama.
Bedazzled: Iran’s Rebel Feminists at London’s Curve Gallery
Malu Halasa tours the exuberant exhibition from artist Soheila Sokhanvari that celebrates strong Iranian women.