TRANSLATING ULYSSES

Duration: 70 mins
Type: Documentary
Year: 2023

Directors:
Aylin Kuryel & Fırat Yücel

Producer:
Özgür Doğan

Country:
Turkey, Netherlands

Languages:
Kurdish (Kurmanji), Turkish, English, Dutch

Synopsis:
Kawa Nemir is like a walking dictionary of the Kurdish language. Whenever he hears a new word or an idiom, he records it and he never forgets. Considering the Kurdish language his home, he wanders from one exile to another. But how to transfer this collective memory into paper? With its vast, infinite range of words, symbols and anti-colonial resonance, James Joyce’s Ulysses becomes an obsession for him. A translation that would encapsulate all the Kurdish words and idioms he collected throughout the years. Exhausted from political prosecutions and language ban, he flees Turkey and takes refuge at Anne Frank’s former house in Amsterdam, now serving as a residence for exiled writers. Will he be able to finish the translation of Ulysses and publish it?

Firat Yücel – Co-director

Ayiln Kuryel – Co-director

*AFTER SCREENING*
Q+A with writer Kawa Nemir.

Sun 14 May 2023, 15:00 – Screen 1