PVLF 2025

Interview with Sarah Zia, Editor of “Letters From Gaza”

A searing tribute to Gaza’s voices—Letters from Gaza is a call to witness, preserve truth, and awaken our collective humanity through raw, real stories.
on Jul 07, 2025

Frontlist: Sarah, “Letters from Gaza” isn’t just a book—it’s a memorial, a message, and a mirror. When this manuscript first came to you, what was your first emotional and editorial response? Did it feel like any project you had ever worked on before?

Sarah: Letters from Gaza is a unique book. The process of procuring this book started in May 2024, almost a year after the ongoing genocide, when I connected with Marcia at Arab Lit Quarterly with one complex question: would you know of anyone in Gaza who is documenting their experience?

She introduced me to Mahmoud and Mohammed, two writers and cultural preservers who were collecting writings from authors, professionals, and people spread across the Gaza Strip, in the hope of preserving their collective experience. They wrote through displacements, missile attacks, loss of home, loss of family, and friends.

When I asked them how they were still able to write, I remember they said that “these stories might be their only sign of life in this world.” And I realized that while we get to live full lives with lunches, friends, holidays, busy workdays, tight schedules—for them, writing was the most human act they were able to perform. At a time when they were being tested with starvation, loss of dignity, and attacks on life, getting up each day and writing their experiences while trying to survive and save themselves was a precious aspect that allowed them to feel the essence of life. It helped them preserve hope, kindness, love, and compassion.

This book was compiled in the moment of the ongoing destruction; every piece of writing was shared immediately after being written and compiled over a period of 8 months.

Mahmoud and Mohammed collected the works from 37 authors and sent them in batches when they could get internet connectivity.

When I first received the writings, I remember suddenly feeling like—it feels like these are my friends who this is happening to—and that’s because I suddenly learnt their names, their fears, what they liked and didn’t. I heard their thoughts in their distinct voices; suddenly, the people of Gaza went from just being a population I read about in the news to people I knew—people like me, with dreams like me—and suddenly everything about the ongoing destruction in Gaza felt more personal.

And that was the idea behind the book. We are a generation that has watched this unfold on our screens, and I realized it left many of us feeling helpless and startled. Working on this book and reading it feels like an act of solidarity—something you and I can do for the people of Gaza by sharing and upholding their stories and ensuring they are passed down from hand to hand.

Working on this book felt like a lot of responsibility. There was a sense of larger purpose, and most importantly, it was a lesson for life—a lesson in how to be compassionate, kind, loving, hopeful, and helpful even when I am crumbling—because that is what we witness through the writings in this book.

Frontlist: You worked with translators from across the world—Egypt, Lebanon, the U.S., and London—to bring these writings to life. What were some of the challenges and revelations that came with translating not just language, but emotion, culture, and silence?

Sarah: The biggest challenge was that we didn’t have access to the individual authors once the writings were shared, as many of them were displaced, phone lines cut off, and internet inaccessible. We were not able to get their feedback on the translations in time, and some I have not heard back from till today. We had to rely on our instinct, intention, and purpose while translating the books to ensure we stayed as authentic to the original voice and emotions documented by the writers, just relying on the cues within the writings because these experiences were far from imaginable. But I do believe these writings bring us closest to an understanding of what this reality feels like.

Frontlist: The book includes poetry, letters, and monologues—formats that feel intensely personal. What editorial philosophy guided you in preserving the rawness of these voices while still creating a cohesive reading experience?

Sarah: Our writers were dispersed and displaced across the Gaza Strip, and they were not consistently in touch with each other, which makes each piece so individualistic and gives us a large insight into the emotions of the people in Gaza. Thereby, there was no chronology or arc, so to speak. Hence, my editorial philosophy was to first identify the individual feelings in each piece, and then find commonalities in all of them that helped me understand what the larger echo of feelings was and how they shifted. I realized that the writings held a mirage of emotions such as disbelief, fear, anger, the shock of consistent loss, grief, and an extraordinary sense of hope. From these observations, I created a loose structure for myself and let each writing guide me. I endeavored to arrange them in a way that would allow the reader to experience the flow of changing emotions as the days and months passed.

Frontlist: Many of the contributors wrote with urgency, under siege. What editorial boundaries did you set to ensure their stories were treated ethically, without polishing away their pain or diluting their voices for readability?

Sarah: Letters from Gaza has minimal editorial intervention, and when I say that, I mean I consciously decided not to make any changes to lines, wordings, or even structure unless it felt context was missing. Because when I first read the writings very early on, I decided that my role here is to bear witness, and I needed to edit this as a witnessing editor to ensure the impact it had on me was shared with the people. It was also not possible and never felt fair to choose any word, adjective, or phrase from a distance because it could never authentically reflect what was actually happening—because you cannot simulate or imagine this reality. This was real life; as dystopian as it feels, it could not get more real than what they had written. Adding to that, we need to understand that the people in Gaza are highly intelligent and perceptive human beings. They are at the core of the most debated political, geographical, historical, and social conflict in the world, and they have lived with this far longer than we have been aware of it. So there wasn't much direction needed in terms of what could be written; they knew and understood exactly what they wanted to convey, and they have a very clear vision, which was to convey to the readers nothing but honest emotions, their identity, their message, their voices, and their truth.

Frontlist: Knowing that this is the first on-ground war writing to come out of Palestine since the Nakba in 1948, did you feel a different kind of editorial pressure—historically, politically, emotionally? How did you prepare yourself for that responsibility?

Sarah: One of the many unrealized privileges in life is being able to tell our stories, our truth in our own words, and have people listen. The writers of Nakba, and most Palestinian literature, have been reflective post the passing of the events, and owning their narratives has been one of the many rights denied to them. Hence, this book, along with a sense of responsibility, also felt like a sense of direction and an answer to the conundrum of how one helps and aids. Bearing witness is a massive act of solidarity, and this book is a drop in that ocean and a direction towards a lot more that needs to be done. It will take a while to process the magnitude and the significance of this book, because what fueled me post reading it was the need to have it reach as many people as possible, because the responsibility didn’t end with publishing this book; I realized it actually started there.

Frontlist: You work at Penguin Select, which is rooted in publishing globally resonant, human stories. How does Letters from Gaza reflect the vision of your imprint, and why do you believe stories like these are more vital than ever right now?

Sarah: We are living in ironic times, we are a generation that is most interconnected and has a view into the most private moments of each other's lives, yet we are also massively influenced by misinformation and living in a world that is increasingly becoming more divisive and segregated. Inundated with information, the world starts to feel like just a vortex of noise. And amidst that, art, stories, and books cut through the chaos, ground us, and help us personally engage with narratives, learn in peace, and develop thoughts without active influence. When people from different communities and backgrounds start to feel as mere optics and statistics, art and stories allow us to engage with the life that we may not be witnessing in person but still help us connect with emotions that resonate just like ours, just felt by somebody with a different name, skin color, clothes, and address.

And this human engagement is what helps break barriers; it helps bridge gaps when you realize that the person across the ocean hurts just like you, cries just like you, seeks joy just like you.

The ambition behind Penguin Select is to connect people through stories that speak to everyone despite their differences. And Letters From Gaza is an embodiment of that vision. This book is also so important for readers like me, as it opens your mind and heart, helps elevate your sense of compassion and empathy, softens our minds and hearts, and opens us to dialogue and communication. And there is just so much to learn from people who have been striving to survive this for a year and a half; it allows us to learn from each other, it allows us to incorporate from experiences that are not ours but can give us lessons for life.

Frontlist: Editors are usually behind the scenes, yet in this case, you became a steward for lives, memories, and voices from a region in crisis. Has this book changed your relationship to editing, storytelling, or even the idea of what publishing should be?

Sarah: An editor is that unseen steward whose choices impact what your bookshelf looks like, and what we bring to the table is not just our skillsets, but our vision, emotions, and hopes for the future. I have always believed that books have the power to shape minds, and that spot on the shelf is a sign of being preserved for posterity, reflective of the realities of our time. Hence, there is immense responsibility in this job. This book has solidified my idea and vision of what publishing should be: the stories we tell should connect people, not tear them apart; if one of my self-development titles helps anyone feel more confident, helps someone from a small town in their transition to a big city, then my book is a success. There is a space for every story and every book, but I believe we need to consciously think about the value addition of each printed title towards a more tolerant, compassionate, informed, educated, and equitable society. It will always be a work in process, but it must be ongoing.

Frontlist: “Letters from Gaza” is often described as a call to bear witness. As the person who held these voices closest during the editorial process, what do you hope readers truly see, feel, or question after finishing this book?

Sarah: My biggest hope from this book is that reading the powerful yet delicate writings helps people connect deeply with their sense of humanity. And I don’t mean that just as members of society or at a macro level; I hope for that in our daily lives as well. I hope it makes us more forgiving, more tolerant, more open to understanding different perspectives, gives us courage to be the strength of those weaker, and I hope it makes us love and be kind abundantly. It is a matter of luck and privilege that we are safe and the people in Gaza are not; hence, it is important to introspect how and when we seek accountability, how we exercise our civic rights so that the events we are witnessing are not replicated for anyone else. I hope this book gives us, the readers, a sense of purpose; and it can be an answer to the echoing question of “what do we do to help,” as preserving and sharing authentic stories plays a very important role in bringing any change.