Sleeping in the Courtyard: Contemporary Kurdish Writers in Diaspora

Sleeping in the Courtyard shines a light on works by a group of diverse contemporary Kurdish women and nonbinary writers living in Kurdistan and in diaspora. Featuring poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and graphic work by both emerging and well-established writers, this collection recognizes the complex web of physical and lingual displacement of the Kurdish people. It presents work originally written in English and work translated from Kurdish dialects as well as from Arabic, Turkish, Persian, and Swedish. A few works in Kurdish dialects appear alongside their translations, both in recognition of the history of linguicide and to push against oppressive attempts to strip away Kurdish language.

This collection showcases variety in representation, point of view, identity, intersectional experience, geographical context, and style. What emerges is the anthesis of erasure. Sleeping in the Courtyard brings together historically isolated writers in community--and invites readers to join around their table to share in their stories, laughter, tears, secrets, memories, and warmth.