Returning to Haifa
Ghassan Kanafani · 1936–1972 · Palestine
Originally A'id ila Haifa (Arabic) · translated by Barbara Harlow and Karen E. Riley
Why it matters
Palestinian parents return to their abandoned Haifa home after 1967 and find the Jewish family raising the infant son they left behind in the chaos of 1948. Kanafani's most devastating novella, refusing any easy claim on grief or blame.
At a glance
political noveltragedy
Difficulty 5/10medium pace62 pagesA short, tightly focused novella whose emotional and political ambiguity resists a simple reading.
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