Mahmoud Darwish

A collection of autobiographical essays by one of the greatest poets to come from Palestine. "Every beautiful poem is an act of resistance," asserts Darwish. Both voice of the Palestinian people and one of the most transcendent poets of his generation, Mahmoud Darwish also wrote several remarkable volumes of autobiographical essays over the course of his life. First published in Beirut in 1973, these probing essays ask vital questions about the existentially complex realities the Palestinians in Israel face and the ambiguity of Darwish’s own identity as an Israeli Palestinian. They call upon myth, memory, and language to delve into the poet’s experience of house arrest, his encounters with Israeli interrogators, and the periods he spent in prison. Meditative, lyrical, rhythmic, Darwish gives absence a vital presence in these linked essays. Journal is a moving and intimate account of the loss of homeland and, for many, of life inside the porous walls of occupation—no ordinary grief.

Journal of an Ordinary Grief

qaṣīdah

Jidārīyah

أثر الفراشة

Ka-zahr al-lawz aw abʻad

Authoritative information and wonderful images At the back of the book is a 12-page foldout timeline which can be detached and displayed on a wall or notice board, offering an attractive quick visual reference to the key periods, events and developments of Islamic civilizations from approximately the 7th to the 20th centuries AD. The 32-page book offers introductions to each of the periods and dynasties, with short sections on particular themes and on the great achievements of Islamic art and culture over the centuries. Both book and timeline are richly illustrated throughout with color photographs, including numerous objects from museum collections.

Almond Blossoms and Beyond

لا تعتذر عما فعلت

One of the Arab world's greatest living poets uses the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the shelling of Beirut as the setting for this sequence of prose poems. Mahmoud Darwish vividly recreates the sights and sounds of a city under terrible siege. As fighter jets scream overhead, he explores the war-ravaged streets of Beirut on August 6th (Hiroshima Day). Memory for Forgetfulness is an extended reflection on the invasion and its political and historical dimensions. It is also a journey into personal and collective memory. What is the meaning of exile? What is the role of the writer in time of war? What is the relationship of writing (memory) to history (forgetfulness)? In raising these questions, Darwish implicitly connects writing, homeland, meaning, and resistance in an ironic, condensed work that combines wit with rage. Ibrahim Muhawi's translation beautifully renders Darwish's testament to the heroism of a people under siege, and to Palestinian creativity and continuity.

August, Beirut, 1982

Memory for Forgetfulness

الأعمال الشعرية الكاملة

One of the most transcendent poets of his generation, Darwish composed this remarkable elegy at the apex of his creativity, but with the full knowledge that his death was imminent. Thinking it might be his final work, he summoned all his poetic genius to create a luminous work that defies categorization. In stunning language, Darwish’s self-elegy inhabits a rare space where opposites bleed and blend into each other. Prose and poetry, life and death, home and exile are all sung by the poet and his other. On the threshold of im/mortality, the poet looks back at his own existence, intertwined with that of his people. Through these lyrical meditations on love, longing, Palestine, history, friendship, family, and the ongoing conversation between life and death, the poet bids himself and his readers a poignant farewell.

In the Presence of Absence

This remarkable collection of poems, meditations, fragments, and journal entries was Mahmoud Darwish’s last volume to come out in Arabic. This River is at once lyrical and philosophical, questioning and wise, full of irony, resistance, and play. Darwish’s musings on unrest and loss dwell on love and humanity; myth and dream are inseparable from truth. Throughout this personal collection, Darwish returns frequently to his ongoing and often lighthearted conversation with death. A River Dies of Thirst is a collection of quiet revelations, embracing poetry, life, death, love, and the human condition.

A River Dies of Thirst

Dans la présence de l'absence

Contains translations of the popular Palestinian poet's work focusing on themes including loss and exile.

Poems

If I Were Another

على هذه الأرض ما يستحق الحياة

When the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish died in 2008, his friends visited his home and retrieved poems and writings, some of which are gathered together in this volume, and translated into English for the first time.

Early and Late Poems

I Don't Want This Poem to End

أوراق الزيتون

الرسائل

Anā al-muwaqqiʻ adnāh Maḥmūd Darwīsh

عاشق من فلسطين

مديح الظل العالي

Mahmoud Darwish was the Palestinian national poet. One of the greatest poets of the last half-century, his work evokes the loss of his homeland and is suffused with the pain of dispossession, exile and loss. His poems also display a brilliant acuity, a passion for and openness to the world and, above all, a deep and abiding humanity. Here, his close friends John Berger and Rema Hammami present a beautiful new translation of two of Darwish's later works, his long masterpiece "Mural," a contemplation of his life and work written following life-threatening surgery, and his last poem, "The Dice Player," which Darwish read in Ramallah a month before his death. Illustrated with original drawings by John Berger, Mural is a testimony to one of the most important and powerful poets of our age.

Mahmoud Darwish

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