WRITERS’ WORSHOP with acclaimed writers DINAW MENGESTU and BURHAN SӦNMEZ
Saturday, February 28th from 10-1pm
at the East Side Freedom Library
join Burhan Sönmez and Dinaw Mengestu for an intimate writers’ workshop on using craft to process moments of crisis. Drawing on their experiences writing through political upheaval, exile, and uncertainty, Burhan and Dinaw will guide participants through conversation and exercises focused on transforming fear, disruption, and grief into language that clarifies and endures.
Limited spots available. Email info@eastsidefreedomlibrary.org to register.
WRITER BIOS
DINAW MENGESTU, is the President of PEN America. Mengestu directs both the Center for Ethics and Writing and the Written Arts Program at Bard College. A PEN America trustee since 2016, he has won the prestigious 2012 MacArthur Genius Grant and the National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Award. He has reported on conflicts in Darfur, Uganda, and eastern Congo in articles for The New York Times, The New Yorker, Harper’s, Granta, and Rolling Stone.
Mengestu’s first three novels – The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears (2007), How to Read the Air (2010), All Our Names (2014), all New York Times Notable Books – explore the psychic toll and complexities of immigration from his native Ethiopia to the United States. His most recent novel, Someone Like Us (2024), shifts to the U.S.-born second generation, examining how displacement shapes their identity and a sense of belonging; it was named one of former President Obama’s ten best books of 2024.
BURHAN SӦNMEZ, a Kurdish novelist from Türkiye, is the President of PEN International. His novels have been translated into more than forty languages and received international prizes, including the EBRD Literature Prize, the Orhan Kemal Novel Award and Vaclav Havel Library Award. He translated the poetry book of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell by William Blake into Turkish.
He received a Law degree from the University of Istanbul and worked as a lawyer before moving to Britain due to political reasons. Sonmez is a Senior Member of Hughes Hall and Trinity College, University of Cambridge. From Middle East Technical University in Ankara to The Università della Svizzera italiana in Lugano he has given lectures on literature and freedom of expression in various universities.