Writers Out Loud: Playwrights on Palestine/Israel II
A Conversation between Arthur Milner and Ehab Lotayef
Two extraordinary writers sit down together to converse on the situation in Palestine and Israel as it connects to their arts practice and activism. This is the second in a series of online events in 2021 exploring Palestine and Israel through the eyes and work of writers.
Presented by the Quebec Writers’ Federation.
Arthur Milner
Arthur Milner is a playwright and theatre director. His most recent play is Getting to Room Temperature, “a hard-hitting, sentimental and funny one-person play about death.” Facts, a murder mystery set in the West Bank, premiered in Ottawa in 2010 and, in 2013, toured ten cities in Palestine and Israel in Arabic translation. Facts has also been produced in London, the U.K., and Istanbul (in Turkish). Arthur was Artistic Director of Ottawa’s Great Canadian Theatre Company and has worked as a dramaturge across Canada. He writes on politics and culture for inroadsjournal.ca and has taught theatre at Concordia and Carleton universities, University of Ottawa, University of Calgary and, soon, the University of Regina. He now lives in Regina where his wife, Jennifer Brewin, is Artistic Director of Globe Theatre and where he and Rania Al-Harthi recently read the poems of Mahmoud Darwish for the Globe’s Art Out Loud Festival.
Ehab Lotayef
Ehab Lotayef is a Canadian IT Manager, poet, writer, and community activist of Egyptian origin. He has published a bilingual poetry collection, To Love a Palestinian Woman (TSAR 2010), and the CBC produced his play Crossing Gibraltar in 2006. His writings also appear in many anthologies and zines, and he has written numerous Op Eds on various subjects for various Canadian papers over the years.
Ehab is deeply involved in social and community work, including campaigns against the sanctions and war on Iraq, opposing the blockade of Gaza, and advocating for Native Rights. Over the years he has served on the boards of the Egyptian Canadian Coalition for Democracy, the Muslim Council of Montreal, Muslim Schools of Montreal, the Canadian Arab Federation, Fair Vote Canada, and Teesri Duniya Theatre, as well as on the Board of Governors of McGill University. He is currently on the boards of Montreal City Mission and QWF.