Return Hardcover by Ghada Karmi

Product Details

• Publisher: Verso (2015-05-19)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 336 pages
• ISBN-13: 9781781688427
• Item Weight: 521.64 grams
• Dimensions: 21.74 x 14.61 x 2.97 cm

An extraordinary memoir of exile and the impossibility of finding home, from the author of In Search of Fatima

“The journey filled me with bitterness and grief. I remember looking down on a nighttime Tel Aviv from the windows of a place taking me back to London and thinking hopelessly, ‘flotsam and jetsam, that’s what we’ve become, scattered and divided. There’s no room for us or our memories here. And it won’t be reversed.’”

Having grown up in Britain following her family’s exile from Palestine, doctor, author and academic Ghada Karmi leaves her adoptive home in a quest to return to her homeland. She starts work with the Palestinian Authority and gets a firsthand understanding of its bizarre bureaucracy under Israel’s occupation.

In her quest, she takes the reader on a fascinating journey into the heart of one of the world’s most intractable conflict zones and one of the major issues of our time. Visiting places she has not seen since childhood, her unique insights reveal a militarised and barely recognisable homeland, and her home in Jerusalem, like much of the West Bank, occupied by strangers. Her encounters with politicians, fellow Palestinians, and Israeli soldiers cause her to question what role exiles like her have in the future of their country and whether return is truly possible.

About the Author

Ghada Karmi was born in Jerusalem and trained as a doctor of medicine at Bristol University. She established the first British-Palestinian medical charity in 1972 and was an Associate Fellow at the Royal Institute for International Affairs. Her previous books include Jerusalem Today: What Future for the Peace Process?, The Palestinian Exodus 1948-1998 (with Eugene Cotran), Married to Another Man: Israel's Dilemma in Palestine, and the best-selling In Search of Fatima. She writes frequently for the Guardian and the Nation.