In his powerful new memoir, Danny Ramadan takes aim at Western assumptions about refugee and immigrant narratives. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * In his powerful new memoir, Danny Ramadan takes aim at Western assumptions about refugee and immigrant narratives. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? In his powerful new memoir, Danny Ramadan takes aim at Western assumptions about refugee and immigrant narratives.
“It’s true that I’m a queer man who grew up in a homophobic society; Damascus force-fed me its cruelty on a daily basis,” he recalls in the first chapter of . “But it also spoke to me in my mother tongue and giggled at my jokes,” he wryly adds. “It opened its arms and embraced me on a late-night stroll, and it hid me in its alleyways as I had my first kiss.
It covered me with its star-dotted sky when I had no home but its roads.” Hannes van der Merwe photo Danny Ramadan resists easy conclusions, diving fearlessly into what it means to be a queer man in a Muslim society where violence is acceptable, and loving who you choose is not. Ramadan’s is an epic, cross-border journey.
From his humble childhood in Damascus, to bearing witness to the Arab Spring uprisings, to his traumatic imprisonment in Syria, to the sunny beaches of Lebanon and his eventual arrival in Canada, Ramadan’s coming of age is a dramatic and inspiring read. The Syrian-born, Vancouver-based write.