In Yasmin Zaher’s debut novel The Coin, the narrator is a wealthy Palestinian woman with impeccable style and meticulous hygiene. She lives in New York and struggles with an ideal of self and an ideal of life that are just out of reach: her inheritance is inaccessible, her homeland exists only in her memory, and no amount of scrubbing and cleaning satisfies her growing obsession.

As her protagonist desperately strives to put down roots and gain control over her circumstances, the novelist herself reflects on the significance of developing Palestinian characters that are as liberated as they are imperfect. A reading from the novel and following conversation will explore the material and existential aspects of statelessness, vulnerability, and resilience as well as the possibilities of art in times of darkness.

Yasmin Zaher is a Palestinian writer and journalist who was born in Jerusalem. She earned a BSc in Biomedical Engineering at Yale University and an MFA in Creative Writing at The New School, where she was advised by Katie Kitamura. As a journalist, she has written for Haaretz and Agence France-Presse. She currently lives in Paris. The Coin, her first novel, has been called “a smart, sneering novel of capital and its consequences” by the New York Times.

Presented in English

Featuring a musical performance by Barenboim-Said Akademie student Eden Meyer Khaiat