“The white ocean. Literatures around the Mediterranean”

TIRANA, Oct. 2 – Eight writers from Albania, Germany, Switzerland and Egypt will come together in Tirana this weekend to discuss literature around the Mediterranean as part of the German October events that are being held in Albania. Staged under the motto “Europe as a remembrance space” the international literature festival called “The white ocean. Literatures around the Mediterranean” will be held at the National Theatre of Comedy in Tirana on October 4 and 5 bringing discussions and public readings.
Khaled Al-Khamissi, Ilma Rakusa, Hans-Ulrich Treichel and Albania’s Lindita Arapi, Arian Leka, Luljeta Lleshanaku, Fatos Lubonja and Agron Tufa will discuss issues that unite and divide them around the Mediterranean.
Discussions and public readings by the authors will focus on the treatment of collective memory in literature, the way totalitarian experience is processed and how it finds its way to enter the literary memory of each of these countries. “In this process, the Mediterranean serves as a linking element between different countries and culture in Europe and beyond, i.e a space both political and poetic. To Albanians, especially during the 40-year dictatorship the Mediterranean symbolized yearning and hope for denied freedom in these decades. After the fall of communism, the neighbouring countries turned into the spaces where dreams for a better life in the freedom that had been won were projected,” organizers say.