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Scene I

The following version of this book was used to create this lesson plan: Akhtar, Ayad. Disgraced. Back Bay Books, 2013. Paperback version.

Scene 1

• The play, set in the summer of 2011, opens in an expensively-furnished apartment on New York City’s Upper East Side.

• Emily, a white woman in her early 30s, is painting her husband Amir, a man of 40, of South Asian descent, in his shirt and jacket but without pants.

• Emily is painting Amir in the style of Velázquez’ Portrait of Juan de Pareja.

• They are talking about a confrontation in which Amir felt a waiter was looking at him and Emily in an offensive, judgmental way.

• In flawless English that indicates that he is native to America, Amir tells Emily she should get her black Spanish ex-boyfriend to come sit for her paintings.

• She says that her father is still traumatized from this previous...

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