HAUNTED

“When the bombs fell, the first thing we did was run away. It was not until later that we realized we had not looked back. We were not allowed to say goodbye to our home, our memories, our photos and the life that was lived within them. We have become vacant like these spaces; our hastily packed belongings and the forgotten things haunt us.” An uncertain existence followed the escape and expulsion from Syria that tumbled into a physical and mental nowhere, a non-space between yesterday and tomorrow. Haunted speaks of the loss of home and security, of the real and metaphorical meaning which a house, a home has in one’s life.

Liwaa Yazji was born in Moscow in 1977. She is a graduate of Theater Studies in Damascus and worked in the fields of theater dramaturgy, playwriting, and screen writing. She acted in Abdullatif Abulhamid’s September Rain (Syria, 2009). In 2012 she published her first play Here in the Garden and is currently preparing the second one with the Royal Court Theatre. In 2014, her poetry book Peacefully, we leave home was published in Beirut. Haunted is Liwaa Yazji’s directorial debut and was shown in numerous festivals.