Film screening + conversation with Saleem Haddad

An evening dedicated to the life and legacy of Edward Said, beginning with a screening of the BBC documentary Exile: Edward Said, followed by a conversation with writer Saleem Haddad.

Taking Said’s memoir, Out of Place, as a starting point, the discussion will explore some of the questions that shaped both his life and his wider body of work: exile, displacement, class, family, language, illness, memory, and the feeling of never fully belonging anywhere.

Said began writing Out of Place after receiving a serious medical diagnosis, turning back toward the world of his childhood across Palestine, Lebanon, and Egypt, a world shaped by movement, rupture, exile, and the knowledge that much of what he remembered could no longer be recovered.

Through the documentary and conversation, the evening will consider how Said wrote about home from a position of displacement, how memory becomes a way of preserving places that have been lost or transformed, and what it means to live between languages, histories, and identities.

More than a discussion of one memoir, the evening will reflect on Said’s enduring intellectual and political legacy, and on the questions of home, belonging, and exile that continue to resonate across Palestinian life today.

Programme

7:00 PM — Film Screening: Exile: Edward Said BBC Documentary

8:00 PM — Conversation with Saleem Haddad: Beginning with Out of Place and expanding into Said’s life, writing, and legacy.

The restaurant will be open.