Recognizing the Stranger
On Palestine and Narrative
A novelist asks what fiction's moment of recognition means when the recognition never arrives.
Isabella Hammad delivered this as the Edward Said Memorial Lecture at Columbia in late September 2023, nine days before the October 7 attacks, and published it a year later with an afterword. It takes the novelist’s device of recognition, the moment a character finally sees their situation, and asks what it means politically when recognition of Palestinians is repeatedly deferred or made conditional.
Recommended by 1 Person
Andrea Long Chu
A lucid lecture from a talented novelist, delivered just nine days before Oct. 7 and published a year later.
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