Ali Chahrour

Can one die of a broken heart? The Lebanese cho­reographer Ali Chahrour asks this question in the last part of his trilogy on love, which he concluded in 2021 despite the pan­demic and other crises in Beirut. The first part, «Layl (Night)», was presented at the festival in 2019. In the moving dance piece «The Love Behind My Eyes», Chahrour tells the tragic story of a for­bidden love between two men in the Arabic world. Mohamed Ben Daoud, a theologist and scholar of the Islamic right and Arabic language, fell in love with Mohamed Ben Jamea, a young man from Is­fahan. Daoud’s love was unfulfilled. Eventually, they say, he died of a broken heart.

«The Love Behind My Eyes» is inspired by love stories from the Arabic world and by the ghaz­al, an Arabic-­Persian form of lyric poetry from pre-­Islamic times. Many ancient stories remain untold, such as the one of Ben Daoud and his lov­er, who lived in difficult social and religious con­texts. Shrouded by the voice of a mourning wom­an, the intimate choreography pays homage to for­bidden love. The dance embodies sensuality and the art of love but also conveys the frailty of the protagonists, their pain and silent protest against the oppression of (love) stories deemed to be ille­gitimate. (pg)