Event Type: MJBW2026

THIS EVENT is proudly supported by:

Sophie Stern, Joseph Toltz, Michael Visontay – moderator Benjamin Preiss

Estranged sisters are forced to reckon with their wounds when they inherit their grandmother’s dilapidated home; a rare and fragile booklet of Holocaust songs is almost discarded when found deep in a cupboard; and an obscure legal document in a strongbox leads to a trail of leaves from the Gutenberg bible. In this session, a novelist, a musicologist and a journalist traverse the real and fictitious, to uncover remarkable stories in which physical remnants ‘speak’ from the past.

Ayelet Tsabari is the acclaimed, Israeli-Canadian author of best-selling memoir, The Art of Leaving. Her debut novel, Songs for the Broken-Hearted – a sweeping, multigenerational saga of love, loss and reconnection and the complex history of Yemeni Jews – is a winner of the National Jewish Book Award for Fiction, the Canadian Jewish Literary Award for Fiction, the Association of Jewish Libraries Fiction Award and A Globe and Mail Best Book of 2024.
Ayelet is in conversation with Lee Kofman, Russian-born Israeli-Australian author of six books and editor of three anthologies. Lee is a writing teacher and mentor based in Melbourne.