Emile Habiby on Stage

Body on the Line has a review-in-context of Mohamed Bakri's one-man-show based on Emile Habiby's novel The Secret Life of Saeed, also known as The Pessoptimist, or The Opsimist. Actor and director Bakri, best known for his film Jenin, Jenin, was a close friend of Habiby's and in 2006 wrote and filmed Since You Left, a poetic meditation on the life and death of this leading novelist and politician. A lifelong inhabitant of Haifa, Habiby was only writer to win – and, controversially, accept – both the al-Quds prize given by the PLO and the Israel Prize in 1990.

The production is being staged at the Freedom Theatre in the refugee camp at Jenin, which has also played host to a stage version of Mahmoud Darwish's Memory for Forgetfulness.