Registration REQUIRED by 12pm on April 10, 2026 in order to attend this event.
Please join the Harriman Institute for a book talk by Egana Djabbarova. Moderated by Mark Lipovetsky.
Egana Djabbarova discusses her dazzling debut novel “MY DREADFUL BODY” about a young woman’s vexed coming of age in a traditional Azerbaijani community in Russia, grappling under the weight of Muslim patriarchal norms and a debilitating neurological condition. The mysterious affliction leaves her unable to control her muscles, plagued by pain and speech disorders. Addressing each body part with the scrupulousness of a medical researcher, the narrator explores memories, traditions, and taboos related to her physical self. Egana Djabbarova unveils a hidden world in which illness unexpectedly facilitates her liberation from the fate of an arranged marriage she doesn’t want.
Egana Djabbarova, born in 1992 into an Azerbaijani family in Yekaterinburg, Russia, is a poet, essayist, and scholar. She is the author of several collections of poetry. Having been forced to flee Russia in 2024 because of her LGBTQ activism and opposition to the war in Ukraine, she lives in Hamburg, Germany.
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