Song of a Sad Mother
Carmen-Francesca Banciu
Exploring the struggle of growing up in a dictatorship
Dickinson will host world-renowned author Carmen-Francesca Banciu for a special reading and discussion of her book Mother’s Day: Song of a Sad Mother. The event will take place Wednesday, Sept. 14, at 7 p.m. in the Stern Center Great Room.
Mother’s Day: Song of a Sad Mother explores the struggles of the relationship between a mother and daughter under the communist dictatorship in Romania. Banciu writes that communism rendered men and women into comrades first and foremost, rather than children, mothers and fathers. She explores the strain this placed on children and how growing up in a dictatorship influences those children once they become parents.
Banciu, born in Romania, was banned from publishing her work in her country in 1985, after winning the International Short Story Award of the City of Arnsberg for The Radiant Ghetto. In 1991, she served in the Artists-in-Residence program at the German Academic Exchange Service in Berlin. She continued her residencies at Rutgers University from 2004 to 2005 and at the University of Bath in 2009. Since 2013, she has been the coeditor and deputy director of the e-magazine Levure Littéraire, a transnational, multilingual and interdisciplinary online publication seeking to promote new authors and uplift peace, education and culture. Banciu’s other books include Light Wind in Paradise, Window in Flames, Fleeing Father and Berlin is My Paris.
This event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the department of German and the Max Kade Foundation.
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Published September 6, 2016