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Looking for an excuse to get off the Rock in June for 8 days, all expenses paid, but most importantly, to be mentored in honing your craft? Consider applying for the 2023 Oxbelly Writers Retreat in Costa Navarino, Messinia, Greece. This seems quite the opportunity.

https://www.oxbelly.com/writers-retreat?fbclid=IwAR0Ip8-0dgskRQMVFmPaRMhYm57d4FwmNuyGCnYl5X2FDEoMA_OVeqZOC1s

Writers Retreat Oxbelly is an international community of storytellers with a mission to champion, empower and support independent creators.

An Open Call from Atlantis Culture for writers of poetry and short prose to participate in an event at Goethe-Institut Zypern commemorating the 2007 bombing of Al Mutannabi, Baghdad's bookselling center.

*Registration deadline: 20th February, 2023.

OPEN CALL

Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, 2023

Join in the power of the word to speak out for justice, equality, and freedom!

2023 marks the 20th anniversary of the devastating invasion and occupation of Iraq. It also marks the 16th anniversary of the 5 March 2007 car bombing of Al Mutannabi Street in Baghdad. Named after the 10th-century classical Iraqi poet Al Mutannabi, this street is the historic centre of Baghdad bookselling, known as a sanctuary for diverse voices. The 2007 bombing, which killed over 60 people and wounded around 100, was quickly recognised as an attack on Iraqi culture and humanity.

Two weeks after the bombing, the project Al Mutannabi Street Starts Here was formed in San Francisco, California, USA, as a book arts response to the assault. Writers, artists, and book lovers wrote poems and created hundreds of artist books, prints, posters, and paper art pieces, as well as a photography project honouring assassinated Iraqi academics, to show solidarity with Iraq’s ancient culture of literacy. This work has been displayed around the world, in the US, UK, Italy, Egypt, Baghdad, the Netherlands, Canada, and Sweden.

Each year Al Mutannabi Street Starts Here calls poets, writers, artists, teachers, students, and readers to organize readings in commemoration of the assault. These readings, dedicated to freedom, equality, and social justice, make visible the ways in which an attack on any people and culture is an attack on all of us. In 2023 readings are planned across the US, the UK, and elsewhere.

In Cyprus, the event is organised by Atlantis Culture and will take place at the
Goethe-Institut Cyprus, 21 Markou Drakou Ave, 1102 Nicosia,
on Thursday, 2nd March 2023, at 19.00

The organisers ask poets, writers, and artists who wish to take part in the event to register using the following form: https://forms.gle/ijwFr7s6VydJrieD8

Our very best regards,
Annetta Benzar
Lisa Suhair Majaj
Nora Hadjjisotiriou

#2023