An Interview with Dave Eggers About Zeitoun (Interview‪)‬

Zeitoun (McSweeney's, 2009) is the rare post-9/11 narrative that accepts that life in the United States has fundamentally changed, not just for immigrants or Muslims, but for everyone. It sees the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans as part of a continuum of fundamental cultural change that extends to this day, regardless of superficial political changes. Dave Eggers was struck by the story of Abdulrahman Zeitoun, a Syrian immigrant married to a white American Muslim, Kathy, who together ran a well-known painting and building contracting business, Zeitoun A. Painting Contractor llC, and raised four children. Zeitoun was forty-seven at the time of Katrina. While Kathy and their children left for safety in Baton Rouge and then Phoenix, Abdulrahman, like many New Orleans residents, stayed behind, despite warnings of a flood, to watch over his own house on Dart Street, as well as his office and other properties. A canoe he owned came in handy when rescuing people from his neighborhood who were in imminent danger, not to mention feeding starving dogs and otherwise being useful, even as his own and others' houses were drowned in many feet of water.