Join us as we present the Malka Penn Award for Human Rights in Children’s Literature to Veera Hiranandani for her book The Night Diary.
Tuesday, April 9, 2019
4:00pm – 5:30pm
Konover Auditorium
Thomas J. Dodd Research Center
The Night Diary by Veera Hiranandani is set during one of the most tumultuous events in human history, the 1947 Partition of India, when that newly independent country was split in two: predominantly Muslim Pakistan and majority Hindu India. Twelve year old Nisha feels split as well. Her deceased mother was Muslim, her father is Hindu. It’s become unsafe for her family to remain in their home, which overnight has turned into Pakistan. They must make a dangerous journey across the border into the new India. Nisha relates the terrors and hardships of the journey, as well as the ups and downs of everyday life, through a series of letters she writes to her mother in her diary, the only place she feels safe enough to fully express her feelings. As chaos swirls around Nisha, she ponders fundamental questions: why can’t people of different religions get along? Why is there so much hate and suffering? And, most of all, where is home? Nisha documents her fears and hopes in her diary as she searches for her true home within herself and her family. Slowly, she reaches out to others in friendship, perhaps the only way to confront hate – with love.
For more information, contact: Dodd Center at doddcenter@uconn.edu