Think & Drink with Pulitzer finalist Laila Lalami

February 16, 2016 - February 17, 2016

Hosted by Oregon Humanities

Alberta Rose Theatre

Laila Lalami

Think & Drink sparks provocative conversations about big ideas. The series, which invites the public to think and talk together, reflects Oregon Humanities’ emphasis on infusing important public conversations with critical thinking and fresh ideas. All Think & Drink events are open to the public.

Laila Lalami was born and raised in Morocco, a place whose past and present permeate her writing. A novelist, short story writer, and essayist, Lalami is a unique and confident voice in the conversations about race and immigration that increasingly occupy our national attention. Lalami is a regular contributor to publications including the Nation, Newsweek, and the Los Angeles Times, weighing in on contemporary issues in the Arab world and North Africa. Lalami’s fiction confronts the same questions of race, displacement, and national identity that she addresses in her essays and criticism.

Her first book, "Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits," was inspired by a brief article buried deep within a French newspaper’s website. It mentioned, in just a few lines, that fifteen Moroccan would-be-immigrants had drowned crossing the Strait of Gibraltar trying to get to Spain and to the promise of opportunity. Intrigued, Lalami began to learn more about the wave of illegal immigration that was leading increasing numbers of Moroccans to attempt the same trip and was reminded of the people she knew back home who were unemployed, frustrated, depressed. "Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits" is a collection of short stories about one such group of immigrants attempting to escape Morocco for a better life in Europe. Lalami explores the intriguing, sometimes uncomfortable closeness between her own experiences and the lives of these fictional immigrants, while offering up a lens through which to view our own immigration issues.

Her debut novel, "Secret Son," revisited questions of identity and class. The main character is Youssef El Mekki, a shy, bookish young man living in a slum in Casablanca who discovers that his father is a wealthy businessman. When Youssef’s father welcomes him into a sophisticated, highly corrupt world, Youssef must renegotiate complex issues of family, ideology, and society. The book was long-listed for the Orange Prize.

Lalami’s latest book, "The Moor’s Account," was a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It imagines the life of the first black explorer of America: a Moroccan slave whose voice is missing from the history books. In 1527, a Spanish expedition to Florida met with disaster. Four survivors—three Spanish noblemen and a Moroccan slave—lived with Native American tribes for six years before escaping and wandering through what is now Florida, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Years later, the Spaniards wrote and spoke about their ordeal, but the slave—Mustafa al-Zamori, always called Estebanico—was never asked to share his story. Despite serving as a scout and interpreter, Mustafa/Estebanico was considered an unreliable or unworthy voice in this most extraordinary of narratives.

Click here for additional information on the Think & Drink series.

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Writer Laila Lalami kicked off Oregon Humanities’ 2016 Think & Drink series with a conversation about writing and living across national, linguistic, and religious lines in Portland February 16 and Bend February 17.

Laila Lalami at the Alberta Rose Theatre in Portland, Oregon--February 16, 2016 (Kim Nguyen)

Lalami, who was born and raised in Morocco, is the author of three novels and numerous essays. Her most recent novel, The Moor’s Account, is an imagined memoir of a Moroccan slave, called Estebanico by his Spanish captors, who was the first native African explorer of the Americas. The novel won the American Book Award, the Arab American Book Award, the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, was on the Man Booker Prize longlist, and was a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

In Portland, Lalami talked with Adam Davis, executive director of Oregon Humanities, at the Alberta Rose Theatre. In Bend, she talked with MOsley WOtta at the Volcanic Theatre Pub.

A video of the Portland event may be viewed here.