Newest work from Mahmoud Darwish--the most acclaimed poet in the Arab world

The most celebrated writer of verse in the Arab world.
-Adam Shatz, The New York Times

Poetry from former national poet of Palestine, illustrated by original drawings by John Berger

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 and exile. His poems 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. Illustrated with original drawings by John Berger, Mural is a testimony to one of the most important and powerful poets of our age.

The first English translation of recent poetry by the late Mahmoud Darwish, the most important Palestinian contemporary poet.

Almond Blossoms and Beyond is one of the last collections of poetry that Mahmoud Darwish left to the world. Composed of brief lyric poems and the magnificent sustained Exile cycle, Almond Blossoms holds an important place in Darwish's unparalleled oeuvre. It distills his late style, in which, though the specter of death looms and weddings turn to funerals, he threads the pulses and fragilities and beauties of life into the lines of his poems. Their liveliness is his own response to the collection's final call to bid Farewell / Farewell, to the poetry of pain.

Winner of the 2012 National Translation Award

What Sinan [Antoon] has done with In the Presence of Absence is a kind of miraculous work of dedication and love. Reading this volume is sheer enjoyment and sublimity.
--Saadi Yousef

There are two maps of Palestine that politicians will never manage to forfeit: the one kept in the memories of Palestinian refugees, and that which is drawn by Darwish's poetry.
--Anton Shammas

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.

Darwish is the premier poetic voice of the Palestinian people . . . lyrical, imagistic, plaintive, haunting, always passionate, and elegant--and never anything less than free--what he would dream for all his people. -- Naomi Shihab Nye

Catherine Cobham's translations sway delicately between mystery and clarity, giving a rendition of the master's voice that should impress both those reading Darwish's work for the first time and those who are already familiar with it. -- Fady Joudah, The Guardian

This remarkable collection of poems, meditations, fragments, and journal entries was Mahmoud Darwish's last volume to come out in Arabic.

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; in the pages of River, myth and dream are inseparable from truth.

Throughout this personal collection, Darwish returns frequently to his ongoing (and often lighthearted) conversation with death, warning that eternity does not visit graves and loves to joke.

Palestine as Metaphor consists of a series of interviews with Mahmoud Darwish, which have never appeared in English before. The interviews are a wealth of information on the poet's personal life, his relationships, his numerous works, and his tragedy. They illuminate Darwish's conception of poetry as a supreme art that transcends time and place.

Several writers and journalists conducted the interviews, including a Lebanese poet, a Syrian literary critic, three Palestinian writers, and an Israeli journalist. Each encounter took place in a different city from Nicosia to London, Paris, and Amman.

These vivid dialogues unravel the threads of a rich life haunted by the loss of Palestine and illuminate the genius and the distress of a major world poet.

Mahmoud Darwish (1942-2008), recipient of France's Knight of Arts and Belles Lettres medal, the Lotus Prize, and the Lannan Foundation Prize for Cultural Freedom, is widely considered Palestine's most eminent poet. State of Siege was written while the poet himself was under siege in Ramallah during the Israeli invasion of 2002. An eloquent and impassioned response to political extremity, the collection was published to great acclaim in the Arab world. Munir Akash's translation, including an introduction exploring the rich mythology of these poems, presents the first book-length, bilingual edition of State of Siege to an English audience.

Winner of the PEN USA Literary Award for Translation

Mahmoud Darwish was that rare literary phenomenon: a poet both acclaimed by critics as one of the most important poets in the Arab world and beloved by his readers.

His language--lyrical and tender--helped to transform modern Arabic poetry into a living metaphor for the universal experiences of exile, loss, and identity. The poems in this collection, constructed from the cadence and imagery of the Palestinian struggle, shift between the most intimate individual experience and the burdens of history and collective memory.

Brilliantly translated by Fady Joudah, If I Were Another--which collects the greatest epic works of Darwish's mature years--is a powerful yet elegant work by a master poet that demonstrates why Darwish was one of the most celebrated poets of his time and was hailed as the voice and conscience of an entire people.

Mahmoud Darwish is one of the greatest poets of our time. In his poetry Palestine becomes the map of the human soul.
-- Elias Khoury

The book tugs at the reader's heart page after page, poem after poem, line after line, you cannot remain apathetic for a moment...
--Haaretz

At once an intimate autobiography and a collective memory of the Palestinian people, Darwish's intertwined poems are collective cries, songs, and glimpses of the human condition.

Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone? is a poetry of myth and history, of exile and suspended time, of an identity bound to his displaced people and to the rich Arabic language.

Darwish's poems - specific and symbolic, simple and profound - are historical glimpses, existential queries, chants of pain and injustice of a people separated from their land.

Tilda Swinton's Top Ten Favorite Books for T: The New York Times Style Magazine

Mahmoud Darwish is a literary rarity: at once critically acclaimed as one of the most important poets in the Arabic language, and beloved as the voice of his people. A legend in Palestine, his lyrics are sung by fieldworkers and schoolchildren. He has assimilated some of the world's oldest literary traditions while simultaneously struggling to open new possibilities for poetry. This collection spans Darwish's entire career, nearly four decades, revealing an impressive range of expression and form. A splendid team of translators has collaborated with the poet on these new translations, which capture Darwish's distinctive voice and spirit. Fady Joudah's foreword, new to this edition, addresses Darwish's enduring legacy following his death in 2008.

One of the Arab world's greatest 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. Sinan Antoon's foreword, written expressly for this edition, sets Darwish's work in the context of changes in the Middle East in the past thirty years.

A collection of poems by Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. The poems range from dreamy reflections to bitter longings for the Palestine that was lost when Israel was created in 1948.Mahoud Darwish has published more than thirty books of petry and prose. He is the recipient of many international literary awrds and his work has been translated into more thant twenty-two languages.