Final Discussion: This Arab is Queer: An Anthology by LGBTQ+ Arab Writers
what has happened, my girl?
There’s a shiver in your voice my girl
The sound of an echo
Sitting
Without anyone
Without anything
I am here
And you are there
Sitting there, far away
You are you
But who am I?
Ya Binti يا بنتي, Rasha Nahas
The cover art for this post is by Queer Habibi
Schedule
These are the dates the discussion posts will go up, but remember you can go at your own pace and contribute when you’re ready!
Kick-off: January 5, 2024✓Midway:January 16, 2024✓Final Discussion: Last Minute RSVP Here 🌈
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Remember you can always use the comment section to leave your thoughts, reviews..
Sarah
by Kris Canales
It was while I was researching this book that I stumbled upon your name for the first time. In each video I watched, in each essay I read, in each podcast I listened to people mentioned you: Sarah. Queer and Arab alike: Sarah. They mentioned you by your first name. Like they would a friend: Sarah.
Sarah Hegazi.
I thought to myself, Who is this Sarah? How does so much of the world know of her? Why do they grieve you so? How is it that I grieve you now, too, without having known you?
Your ghost haunted the pages of This Arab is Queer.
Amina’s “An August, a September and My Mother” hit me particularly hard. She sprinkles your name throughout her piece: “When Sarah dies, far away in a land that barely knew her, far from the Cairo that she danced into being and that killed her in return….” Amina mentions her own sadness at being unable to share moments of queer joy and romance with her mother.
I keep thinking about you as I skip around and find “Return to Beirut” where Saleem Haddad writes about his conflicting feelings as he prepares to make a trip back to his first home. “My trip to Beirut will force me to confront the death of the Lebanon that I once knew. It will also force me to mourn my dream of returning.”
I think about how far I am from my own home right now. How I long to go back but know that it isn’t a place where I can fully be myself. At least, not with the people that matter. The people that should know the real me. I think about how we have never talked about why I haven’t had a boyfriend1 in more than two decades. I try not to get upset with their lack of curiosity about me.
I want to go back, but not to that. Not like this. The world feels equal parts more and less tolerant by the day. Women are murdered in droves back home. Bills are being passed to punish the people I love for existing. I wonder how to be brave in all my life’s settings.
I wonder if you longed to go back to Egypt, Sarah, despite it all. If things were different would you be there now? Would you be happy? Hamed Sinno, singer of Mashrou’ Leila talks about his “obsession with the recorded voice” in “Trio”. I think about you at that concert, Sarah, hearing his voice and lyrics. Other people singing and dancing around you. I think of how such a small act in your life having such huge ripples.
I think of my own circumstances and wonder if I have ever been brave a day in my life.
The sadness I feel at your absence from the world is tremendous. And that’s for me. Someone who isn’t a queer Arab and wasn’t aware of your existence until starting this book journey. I felt shame at not knowing of you sooner, I felt honored at having known you now, I felt so melancholy and hopeful as I flipped through the pages and listened to all the queer Arabs in this beautiful memoir. All of my feelings welled up like water slowly coalescing into a drop, hanging there suspended until the weight was too much and it dropped into a sink full of dirty dishes, into a lake of ice cold water, until it finally streaked down my cheek and down a neck covered in freckles and scattered poppy seed beauty marks.
Sarah.
I wish you were still here.
Sarah.
Rest in power.
***
I want more people to know of you. I want them to see how you stood up for yourself (for all of us, in a sense) how the state treated you afterwards, how it was all too much, how we remember you now, how the news got it wrong and didn’t do you justice, how it sparked so many people into action including the editor of This Arab is Queer.
I hope this isn’t the only time queer Arab voices are collected in this manner. I hope that more anthologies like this come to pass. I hope that we continue to remember and honor you in our own way.
Read more about Sarah Hegazi
Watch the documentary (embedded above)
Read in Sarah’s own words: A year after the rainbow flag controversy
Read I Want Sky - prose, poems, and hybrid work celebrating Sarah
🌈 Big thank you to book club member and friend, Amal, for reading my mind across Internet time and space and sending me some links about Sarah.
Final Thoughts
Overall, how strong was the anthology for you?
Now that you’re done reading, how did the book make you feel?
What was your favorite essay? What about it made it your favorite?
Were there any that resonated with you on a deep emotional level, or that challenged your preconceptions?
What did you think of the various narrative styles throughout the anthology? Did you spot any recurring themes?
What questions do you have for the authors if given the opportunity to engage in a discussion with them?
Are there other works of literature or media that you would compare to This Arab is Queer? How does it stand out or differ from other representations of LGBTQ+ experiences in literature?
Share your thoughts in the comments or reply to this email. I’ll see you in the next one! ♥
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I, in fact, had many boyfriends, girlfriends and partners over the years, but I never brought them around my family for a multitude of reasons.
Beautifully written, Kris. Un abrazo. ❤️🏳️🌈 Rest in power, Sarah. ❤️
Thank you for sharing Sarah's story in such depth of character and grace. It feels so surreal how powerful and so recent the story of her life is.