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Hisham Bustani’s “The Monotonous Chaos of Existence” Bookgroup
April 24, 2022 @ 13:00 - 14:00
Free Event / 1 pm Eastern/18:00 UK/19:00 CET
TMR invites you to participate in our monthly bookgroup conversation, in which authors and/or translators join during the second half of the hour. On Sunday, April 24th, writer Hisham Bustani and translator Maia Tabet will join at 1:30 pm Eastern.
The Monotonous Chaos of Existence, stories by Hisham Bustani
The stories within Hisham Bustani’s The Monotonous Chaos of Existence explore the turbulent transformation in contemporary Arab societies. With a deft and poetic touch, Bustani examines the interpersonal with a global lens, connects the seemingly contradictory, and delves into the ways that international conflict can tear open the individuals that populate his world—all while pushing the narrative form into new and unexpected terrain.
“These stories recall the rhythms of poetry, offer up the intimacy of memoir, and often feel more like films than fiction. The Monotonous Chaos of Existence got me thinking about similarly semi-surreal and ecstatic truth tellers Denis Johnson and Chester Himes, a comparison that will have to do for now because I’m still dizzy and not exactly thinking straight after reading these interrogations of the cruelty and absurdity of occupation and so-called post-colonialism. Clear-eyed personal/political storytelling that is exciting, askew, and challenging.”
—Brandon Soderberg, coauthor, I Got a Monster: The Rise and Fall of America’s Most Corrupt Police Squad