My Threatening Poem: Play by Dareen Tatour premieres in Östersund

The Palestinian poet, playwright, photographer and activist Dareen Tatour will premiere her play My Threatening Poem (Min hotfulla diktin Swedish) in Östersund on the 15th of February. The monologue invites audiences to travel back in time to October 2015 when Tatour was imprisoned for her writing that highlighted the injustices Palestinians face while living under occupation. The play has previously been staged in Tel Aviv and Nazareth,as well as in Paris, Brussels, Florence and Oslo together with the Jewish theater artist Einat Weizman. This time,it will be Östersund's turn with a script translated to Swedish by the writer Malin Nord and a performance carried out by actor Malin Tengvard.

Since September 2020, Tatour has been in ICORN residence in Östersund. She arrived in the Swedish city after years of persecution by the Israeli government. Following the publication of her poem Resist My People, Resist Them in 2015, and other social media posts, Tatour was convicted by an Israeli court for 'Incitement to violence and terror' and 'supporting a terrorist organisation'. She was sentenced to prison for 5 months and was in and out of house arrest and court rooms for three years.

Since her release from prison in 2018, Tatour has remained active, using her writing and photography to break the silence on the conditions of Palestinians, particularly Palestinian women. Her courage was recognised in 2018 when she was awarded the Danish Carl Scharenberg Prize, and in 2019, when she was honored with the OXFAM Novib/PEN award for Freedom of Expression.‍

My Threatening Poem is Tatour's 70-min account of how she was treated before, during and after the trial that led to her imprisonment. She wrote it as soon as she came out of prison, feeling an urgency to tell the story. Tatour says:

I wanted to raise urgent questions, I have always wanted to do that with my texts. It was important, not only because my poetry was imprisoned, but because it’s not a risk I’ve only faced. Many more share this fate around the world, writers and journalists who are imprisoned and suffer.

When Tatour arrived at her City of Refuge, she already had a first script in Arabic and English, but she then worked in collaboration with the translator, Östersund Library and the Performing Arts Association Undantaget. The play is scheduled for several performances in Östersund’s theater workshop and in several high schools.

Catharina Andersson, ICORN coordinator in Östersund and a producer for the play, reflects on how this collaboration worked successfully:

When the Performing Arts Association Undantaget heard about Dareen’s script in English, they let us know they were interested in a collaboration and suddenly we were on our way to make plans and apply for funding. The collaboration has been very smooth thanks to everyone working with such an open mind and Dareen being able to be involved in the whole process, from editing the script with the translator, to engaging with the director and actress.