Speech delivered at the National Library of Australia on 12 September 2024, at the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards:
The genesis of Anam came just over twenty years ago, when I was fifteen and stumbled across an Amnesty International newsletter with a photo of my grandfather on the cover. Reading that newsletter, I discovered that Amnesty had adopted my grandfather, Dao Van, as a prisoner of conscience. At the time of the newsletter, my grandfather had been in prison without charge or trial for four years. It was another six years before he was released.
In some ways the campaign to free my grandfather was a failure. My family must have despaired at the powerlessness of their words to Amnesty, to the Red Cross.
Over the last year I’ve been thinking a lot about the inadequacy of words. In February I was asked to write a tribute to a young Gazan. In the six months since I’ve been unable to do it: what formulation of words could be enough?
But as I thought about what I wanted to say tonight, I realised that the words about my grandfather in the Amnesty International newsletter had not entirely failed. They were carried from house to house, from continent to continent, photocopied and passed on, until they found me. I realised then that this is what solidarity looks like: to speak, to write, in the face of despair and powerlessness.
So, in the spirit of solidarity, let me tell you a little about Yousef Dawas. Yousef was a writer. He wrote articles for the Palestine Chronicle, and for the We Are Not Numbers website. He said that he dreamed not of visiting Paris or the Maldives, but other cities in Palestine. He ate chocolate during Israeli airstrikes to deal with the anxiety. He was studying to become a psychoanalyst. He mourned the loss of his family orchard, the trees bearing olives, oranges, clementines, loquat, guavas, lemons and pomegranates, burned by the Israeli Defence Force. On 14 October last year, Yousef and his family were killed by an Israeli missile strike on their home in Beit Lahia.
In Yousef’s memory — but also in remembrance of my grandfather, and in honour of my parents, refugees across three continents — and in a spirit of hope without optimism, I call for the Australian government to create a humanitarian visa for Palestinians. I also call for Australia to fulfill its international obligations by withdrawing all support, direct and indirect, for Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian territory — starting with an arms embargo.
Congratulations once again to all the shortlisted authors, across all categories. Let us continue to build together this house we call Australian literature — and may the door to that house always be open.
Image: Dao Van in 1954 (supplied)
