Personal Info
- Country of residence: Palestine
Information
Dr. Hussam Ramadan is a Palestinian
writer, born in 1990, from Nablus, residing in Germany. He is an English
Literature graduate from An-Najah National University in Nablus, and holds a
PhD in English Studies from Germany.
The doctoral dissertation was
titled: "The role of Palestinian literature translated into English in
defending the Palestinian position before the world."
This book is the first of its kind
that introduced Palestinian literature to the world, and provided literature
with what is important, necessary, and exceptional.
Dr. Hussam is the author of the
book “Show Us Your Face, Handala” 2019, and he is in the process of producing
the book “48”, which consists of short Palestinian stories translated into
English, and an English book entitled: “Translation after the Nakba.”
In addition, he published a novel
titled: "Koma" by Jaffa House for Publishing and Distribution /
Jordan this year.
The writer Hossam Ramadan draws the
features of the future with a solid will and broad knowledge. In exile, vision
is different, thought is free and free, culture is not limited by roles, and
diligence is not killed by opportunities.
I had this interview with him
Who is Hossam Ramadan?
I am Hussam Ramadan, from the
village of Tal Qada, Nablus, I have been residing since 2016 in Tübingen,
Germany, I am currently working as an assistant professor in the English
language department at An-Najah National University, I studied English
literature at the university where I am currently working, and I completed a
PhD in cultural English studies And like me, like many of the youth of
Palestine, we traveled to chart the features of our future away from the great
pressures that our people have been subjected to for more than half a century.
Why did you choose to study
literature? What is its impact on refining your personality as a writer?
I chose literature because it is
one of the best ways to express what is going on inside us with freedom and
honesty. The word that comes out in certain situations may sometimes be
insincere, or we try to beautify it so as not to hurt and embarrass others. But
in literature, we uproot our feelings and re-plant them on top of our hearts.
Paper, literature is one of the highest ways of expression and one of the
things that makes me personally happiest, and I studied literature in order to
learn from the experiences of others. We have to know well that good literature
is the product of life experiences, and every time we read a good work, we
polish ourselves to face life through Learning from the experiences of others,
and through literature, we learn about the cultures and languages of others, so
we have prepared ourselves internally to treat those who are strangers to us, I
mean there are strangers in terms of culture, lifestyle, language, religion,
customs and traditions, and so on.
Alienation opens horizons for
freedom, and the horizon expands to accept cultures. How did alienation
contribute to refining your personality? Did it influence your writing?
One of the sayings that is still
stuck in my mind; What Hitler said when he said: "Three things make men:
prison, military, and alienation. If you haven't tried one of them, know that
your place is with your mother."
I did not know well the meaning of
that saying until when I traveled, because I learned a lot here, here the
person is at stake, no father wakes you up from your sleep, no mother prepares
you morning coffee, no brother fights you over a shirt that you stole from him,
and no sister stands and looks at elegance Your dress, here you are alone, and
you have to rely on yourself only, and every day in exile is harsher than a
hundred in your country, so I try hard to coexist with the culture of the
country, and strive myself in order to prove myself, because I and other
Palestinian youth lived through very difficult circumstances, and this had an
impact In refining our personalities, and this is reflected in my writings that
I started here, the great freedom we live here gives you the opportunity to write
everything that goes on in your thoughts, as well as alienation makes us long
for our days that we lived, so every day I remember my life there, and I try to
make up for this great deficiency And a deep longing to write.
In your novel "Kuma", the
characters wander in Palestine between Nablus and Gaza. Is it homesickness?
What is the impact of the place on the movement of the characters in your
novel?
Yes, this novel I started writing
in the middle of 2018, and I finished it in the middle of the eighth month of
2021, a novel that brings together the two hearts of Palestine, whose residents
never meet due to the difficult political circumstances, although my feet have
never set foot on the land of Gaza before, but they do not Say hello to Nablus,
my hometown.
It must be the longing for the
homeland that made the characters of my novel take the city of Nablus as a
place to perform their main or even secondary roles, but I moved from time to
time between one city and another, Nablus, Jerusalem, Gaza, Jenin, and others,
we see - for example - the need. Safiya, whose origins are from the destroyed
village of Lajoun; She plays a pivotal role in the novel through the great
sympathy she shows with Wissam, the protagonist, and we also receive the child,
Rehana, who tells us the suffering of the people of Gaza at the Gush Katif
checkpoint or checkpoint.
“Mahfouz” as it was known to the
people of the region there, and we see that each character has played a
specific role in a place in a remarkable dramatic way, and thus the multiple
places had a great impact on the sequence of the events of the novel, and that
the multiplicity of places takes the reader out of the element of boredom that
may engulf him if it revolves Narrated events in only one place.
When you searched for texts of
Palestinian writers for the purpose of translating them into a special book,
you did not find a database and resorted to personal research. What is the
importance of documenting texts? And the importance of having a plan at the
Ministry of Culture to pay attention to literature globally? How much does the
Palestinian novel serve this matter?
Not exactly, because I was sure that
the Palestinian literature translated into English lacks an electronic crucible
that collects all the information that will benefit the students in the future.
The positives that benefit Palestinian literature, as Palestinian literature
carries within it the Palestinian cause, and its translation and documentation
of translation is in favor of the Palestinian cause, which many around the
world are ignorant of or try to pretend they are ignorant of, and that
archiving Palestinian literature encourages English language departments to
teach Palestinian literature with Palestinian literature, and to The Ministry
of Education will also benefit from this project to include Palestinian texts
and poems in the books of school students so that they understand their cause
and the suffering of the people in the homeland and diaspora in a new language
in which they can stand by their cause in the future. Many people want to
write, but what is the use of writing if it remains confined to us Arabs? We
need to motivate translators to convey the image of Palestine to the world.
This way, the Ministry of Culture can - for example - announce an award for the
best Palestinian novel that has been transferred to other languages, or a short
story or poem. Through this, we can raise the low level of translating
Palestinian literature into English as a global language. By archiving
Palestinian literature, I found that what was translated during the past seven
decades did not exceed 5% of all Palestinian works published since 1948.
Where do you get your characters
from?
The characters in my novel are
realistic, but I added a distinctive character to each character in order to
suit the event that I want to portray and the general goal that I aspire to at
the end of the novel. My father was present in that novel, as well as my
mother, and many of those who had a special influence in my life.
source
Achievements and Awards
- Years in active
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