Award-winning Israeli author Ayelet Tsabari will present "Language, Longing, and Belonging," a discussion of her new, critically acclaimed memoir The Art of Leaving.
Date: Tuesday, February 18, 2020
Time: 4:30 pm
Place: Trinity College, Mather Hall, Wean Terrace Rooms ABC, 300 Summit Street, Hartford
The event is free and open to the public. The talk is sponsored by the Distinguished Scholar lecture by the Department of Language and Culture Studies at Trinity College, ALEPH: The Institute of Jewish Ideas, and the UConn Center for Judaic Studies.
For more information, please contact Lidija Petrus at 860-297-5121 or lidija.petrus@trincoll.edu.
About the Book
In The Art of Leaving, Tsabari tells her story, from her early love of writing and words, to her rebellion during her mandatory service in the Israeli army. She travels from Israel to New York, Canada, Thailand, and India, falling in and out of love with countries, men and women, drugs and alcohol, running away from responsibilities and refusing to settle in one place. She recounts her first marriage, her struggle to define herself as a writer in a new language, her decision to become a mother, and finally her rediscovery and embrace of her family history--a history marked by generations of headstrong women who struggled to choose between their hearts and their homes. Eventually, she realizes that she must reconcile the memories of her father and the sadness of her past if she is ever going to come to terms with herself.
About the Author
Ayelet Tsabari was born in Israel to a large family of Yemeni descent. She is the author of the memoir in essays The Art of Leaving, finalist for the Writer’s Trust Hilary Weston Prize, winner of the Canadian Jewish Literary Award for memoir, and an Apple Books and Kirkus Review Best Book of 2019. Her first book, The Best Place on Earth, won the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature and the Edward Lewis Wallant Award, and was long listed to the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. The book was a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, a Kirkus Review Best Book of 2016, and has been published internationally.