Behrouz Boochani, the award-winning Kurdish-Iranian journalist and filmmaker who has been imprisoned on Manus Island for the last six years, will discuss his memoir via video link on Saturday, November 3 at the Wentworth Falls School of Arts.
No Friend But The Mountain was written in Farsi from Boochani’s mobile phone, one text message at a time, over five years using messaging services such as Whatsapp. Boochani’s messages were translated and compiled into a book by interpreter Moones Mansoubi. The book details his epic journey – from fleeing Iran, to travelling by boat from Indonesia to seek refuge in Australia, and his eventual incarceration on Manus Island.
Boochani’s book is promoted as both a voice of witness and an act of survival. Boochani interweaves stories, recollections and anecdotes with poetry to offer a vivid portrait of the lives of those incarcerated on Manus Island.
“I worked on this book for five years. I thought that the best way for me to express my thinking and to tell the story of Manus prison camp and the stories of Manus Island – and Nauru as well – is to write a novel,” said Boochani.
The award-winning author Arnold Zable describes No Friend But the Mountain as “a chant, a cry from the heart, a lament, fuelled by a fierce urgency, written with the lyricism of a poet, the literary skills of a novelist, and the profound insights of an astute observer of human behaviour and the ruthless politics of a cruel and unjust imprisonment”.
Boochani recently won the Anna Politikovskaya investigative journalism award for his documenting of Australia’s offshore immigration detention. Boochani cannot attend the launch of his book in person as he is still detained on Manus Island and has been since 2013, but instead will Skype in from East Lorengu, the refugee accommodation centre where he currently resides.
Boochani is one of thousands of refugees and asylum seekers sent to offshore processing camps on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea or the Pacific Island of Nauru. The Australian government has refused entry to all refugees and asylum seekers arriving by boat since 2013. There are about 400 men still living on Manus Island, most of them are genuine refugees and many of them are from Iran.
The book discussion, beginning at 2.30 pm, is being organised by the Blue Mountains Refugee Support Group and Megalong Books. Joining the event to provide further insight will be guest speakers Gabe Kavanagh, social justice advocate and President of Amnesty International Australia, and Father Frank Brennan, human rights lawyer and social justice campaigner. The event is free but registrations are necessary through the Blue Mountains Refugee Support Group Website: https://www.bmrsg.org.au/events/launch-of-behrouz-boochanis-book/. Previous Skype discussions with Boochani have booked out very quickly.
