“Magical…Lamia Ziadé tells the story of the explosion as she experienced it: from afar but in the heart. A book of love, mourning and anger” — Elle
On the evening of August 4, 2020, an explosion tore through Beirut, leaving nearly 200 people dead, 6, 000 injured, and 300, 000 homeless. The blast was caused by storing thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate alongside a stash of fireworks—a deadly arrangement about which the government had known but done nothing.
For six months straight, French Lebanese author and artist Lamia Ziadé wrote, illustrated, and recorded every new piece of information, every photograph of the wreckage or the wounded. In My Port of Beirut, Ziadé weaves together the play-by-play of the tragedy and the history of Lebanon with her own personal stories and her participation in the 2019 protests against state corruption, laying out the historical and political background that made such a catastrophe possible and, perhaps, inevitable.
Lamia Ziadé is a Lebanese author, illustrator, and visual artist. Born in Beirut in 1968 and raised during the Lebanese Civil War, she moved to Paris at 18 to study graphic arts. She then worked as a designer for Jean-Paul Gaultier, exhibited her art in numerous galleries internationally, and went on to publish several illustrated books, including Ma très grande mélancolie arabe, which won the Prix France-Liban, Ô nuit, ô mes yeux and Bye bye Babylone.
Table of Content
Prologue: August 4, 2020
1: The Sirens of the Port of Beirut
2: The Heroes
3: “A steamer enters the haze of the port of Beirut”
4: The Enchantment of Objects
5: The Saint George Hospital
6: Lady Cochrane
7: The Third Basin
8: My Sister’s Friends
9: Guilt
10: Sacy and Noun
11: The Criminals
12: Report on the Port, 1956
13: My Father’s Stubbornness
14: A Peaceful and Gentle People
15: My Sister on the Telephone
16: Who?
17: Beirut, Nest of Spies
18: The Port, Like the Country
19: Thawra, Birth of a Nation
20: October 17th
21: A Turn for the Worse
About the author
Emma Ramadan is a literary translator based in Providence, RI, where she also co-owns Riffraff bookstore and bar. She has received the PEN Translation Prize, the Albertine Prize, an NEA Translation Fellowship, and a Fulbright for her work. Her translations include Sphinx and In Concrete by Anne Garréta, Pretty Things by Virginie Despentes, Zabor, or the Psalms by Kamel Daoud, and A Country for Dying by Abdellah Taïa.
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