Out of Darkness
with Denise Chong
Hosted by Adrian Harewood In Person Streaming Non-Fict
In this gripping, moving account of human resilience, Denise Chong thoughtfully unwinds the cultural, political and personal circumstances surrounding the brutal attack on Rumana Monzur and her subsequent fight for justice. Dread builds slowly in these pages; Rumana is the steel spine that cuts through the story, standing at the end, unbowed.
Presented in partnership with Library and Archives Canada and the Ottawa Public Library.
Join us for the launch of Out of Darkness: Rumana Monzur's Journey through Betrayal, Tyranny and Abuse.
PLEASE NOTE: NO TICKETS or RSVP required to watch the live-stream directly from this page.
From the bestselling author of The Concubine’s Children and The Girl in the Picture, it is a gripping story of a domestic assault that shocked the world, of the exercise of power and political influence, and of the Bangladeshi woman whose irrepressible spirit found light in sudden darkness.
From the outside, Rumana seemed an unlikely victim of domestic abuse: married to a man of her own choosing and progressing in her career as a professor of international relations at Dhaka University. But in 2011, on return from graduate studies at the University of British Columbia, her husband attacked and blinded her in front of their young daughter. As Rumana's horrifying story garnered international headlines, and connections brought her to Vancouver in an attempt—ultimately futile—to restore her sight, her plight underscored the fact that there are no typical victims of intimate-partner violence.
Denise Chong goes behind the headlines to reveal the devolution of a love story into a tale of tyranny behind closed doors, and the pursuit of justice that proved all the more elusive during the rise of social media. Out of Darkness tells a globe-spanning narrative of loyalty, perseverance and a woman’s determination to face the future and rebuild a life with meaning.
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