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<a href="http://www.mahmouddarwish.com/english/index.htm" eudora="autourl">
http://www.mahmouddarwish.com/english/index.htm</a><br><br>
In the presence of Absence <br><br>
</b>Mahmoud Darwish has quietly left us on Saturday 9 August 2008 after
67 years of a life jumping from one peak to another, rising higher every
time, transcending his own successes. He was a beautiful human being,
able to see what no one else can see: in life, politics, and even people,
expressing his visions in a language that seems to be made only for him
to write with. When he decided to take on this difficult surgery we
thought that he can beat death, like he did several times before… but he,
it seems, with his prophetic insight, could clearly see his “ghost coming
from afar”. <br>
He wanted to surprise death rather than wait for the “time bomb” that was
his artery to explode unannounced… he went prepared, as he always is,
leaving us behind to “nurture hope”.<br><br>
</font><font face="Tahoma" size=4>Mahmoud Darwish<br><br>
</font><font face="Tahoma" size=2>Darwish is considered to be the most
important contemporary Arab poet working today. He was born in 1942
in the village of Barweh in the Galilee, which was razed to the
ground by the Israelis in 1948. As a result of his politi-cal activism he
faced house arrest and imprisonment. Darwish was the editor of Ittihad
Newspaper before leaving in 1971 to study for a year in the USSR. Then he
went to Egypt where he worked in Cairo for Al-Ahram Newspaper and in
Beirut, Lebanon as an editor of the Journal “Palestinian Issues”. He was
also the director of the Palestinian Research Center. Darwish was a
member of the Executive Committee of the PLO and lived in exile between
Beirut <br>
and Paris until his return in 1996 to Palestine. His poems are known
throughout the Arab world, and several of them have been put to
music. His poetry has gained great sophistication over the years, and has
enjoyed international fame for a long time. He has published around 30
poetry and prose collections, which have been translated into 35
languages. He is the editor in chief and founder of the
prestigious literary review Al Karmel, which has resumed publication in
January 1997 out of the Sakakini Centre offices. He published in 1998 the
poetry collection: Sareer el Ghariba (Bed of the Stranger), his first
collection of love poems. In 2000 he published Jidariyya (Mural) a book
consisting of one poem about his near death experience in 1997. In 1997 a
documentary was produced about him by French TV directed by noted
French-Israeli director Simone Bitton. He is a commander of the French
Order of Arts and Letters.<br>
<br>
Muhamoud Darwish is the winner of 2001 Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom.
The prize recognizes people whose extraordinary and courageous work
celebrates the human right to freedom of imagination, inquiry, and
expression. As defined by the foundation, cultural freedom is the right
of individuals and communities to define and protect valued and diverse
ways of life currently threatened by globalization. <br><br>
In the words of poet Naomi Shihab Nye. Mr. Darwish is “the
Essential Breath of the Palestinian people, the eloquent witness of exile
and belonging, exquisitely tuned singer of images that invoke, link, and
shine a brilliant light into the world’s whole heart. What he speaks has
been embraced by readers around the world – his in an utterly necessary
voice, unforgettable once discovered.”<br><br>
Mr. Darwish published his first book of poetry, <i>Leaves of Olives</i>,
in 1964, at the age of 22. Since then, he has published more than twenty
poetry books, including <i>The Adam of</i> <i>Two Edens, Mural, Why Have
you Left the Horse Alone</i>, and <i>Eleven Planets</i>. The University
of California Press has published his prose work, <i>Memory For</i>
<i>Forgetfulness</i>. In 2000, Gallimard published the latest French
anthology of his work and, in 2002, a new English translation of Mr.
Darwish’s <i>Selected Poems</i> will be published in the United
States.Among his accomplishments is the 1969 Lotus Prize and 30
compilations of poetry and prose.<br><br>
<br>
</font><div align="center"><font face="Tahoma" size=3><b> Mahmoud
Darwish: The Expropriated Poet <br>
</b></font></div>
<font face="Tahoma" size=2> <br><br>
<div align="center">To a reader: Do not trust the poem –<br>
The daughter of absence<br>
It is neither intuition nor is it<br>
Thought<br>
But rather, the sense of the abyss…<br><br>
</div>
(State of Siege) <br>
</font><font face="Tahoma" size=3>
<br>
</font><font face="Tahoma" size=2>Born on 13 March 1941 in Al Birweh, a
quaint village in the Galilee, Mahmoud Darwish went on to live a life
that is a poignant example of how far talent and determination, combined
with a precarious life, can carry an individual from a simple background
into the international halls of fame. At the early age of seven, Darwish
and his family were forced to flee to Lebanon to escape the ongoing
massacres by the Israeli Army as it occupied Palestine and, in the
process, destroyed the poet’s village (in addition to over 400 other
Palestinian villages). Returning “illegally” to their country the
following year, he and his family were subjected to military rule and
emergency regulations of the State of Israel established over
expropriated Palestinian land. They were given the status of
“present-absent alien,” a status that will mark the poet from that point
onwards, preventing him from ever finding his homeland, except in his
language and his ever-loving audience.<br><br>
It was as early as 1950 that the poet first realized how the poem can be
“a threat to the sword” as he was harassed by the Israeli military
governor for writing and reciting poetry that expressed his strong sense
of Arab and Palestinian identity. These “harassments” were to continue
until 1970 when he left to Moscow and then to Egypt, to finally settle
for a while in Beirut until the Israeli invasion in 1982. After Beirut he
became a “wondering exile” in Arab capitals, settling in Paris for a
while, then Amman, and finally Ramallah, moving a step closer to the home
which he still cannot reach. The circle is not yet complete….<i>
<br><br>
</font>
<dl>
<dd>“There is no age sufficient for me<br><br>
<dd>to pull my end to my beginning.”<br><br>
</i>
<dd>(Mural)<br><br>
</dl>His life in the exodus somehow helped to ignite the poetic flame
within him and exile became one of the sources of his literary creation.
However, despite his geographic separation from his homeland, Darwish
continued over the years to disrupt the status quo in Israel through the
medium of poetry. In 1988, his widely circulated militant poem “Passers
by in Passing Words,” a poem that he does not think highly of in literary
terms but that nevertheless was met with great acclaim amongst the Arab
public, was cause for a great uproar in Israeli circles, both the right
and left wing alike. A book in French entitled “Palestine Mon Pays:
L’affaire du Poeme,” published by Les Editions de Minuit in 1988,
documents some of the articles that were written in defence of Darwish
and his poem. In a similar manner, but this time in March 2000, Yossi
Sarid, then the minister of education in Israel, suggested the inclusion
of Darwish’s poetry in the Israeli high school curriculum. This
suggestion resulted in a very close no-confidence vote for the Barak
government.<br><br>
The year 2000 witnessed the publication of Darwish’s twentieth book of
poetry, Mural</i>, a masterpiece epic poem which synthesizes his
experience and poetry spanning 36 years as he contemplated impending
“eternity” in a hospital bed after having undergone life-threatening
surgery in 1998. In addition, he has five books of prose, and his work
has been translated into more than 22 languages. <br><br>
His most recent translations in English, “Mahmoud Darwish: Adam of Two
Edens” (Jusoor and Syracuse University Press, 2000) and “The Raven’s Ink:
A Chapbook” (Lannan Foundation, 2001) include a host of Darwish’s most
acclaimed poems written between 1984 and 1999. Even though “he is known
the world over as the</i> poet of Palestine,” as Margaret Obank says in
her review of “The Adam of Two Edens,” Darwish’s poetry “has been
published only sparingly in English.” These two volumes are an excellent
introduction, in English, to this poet who is considered to be
“indisputably among the greatest of our century’s poets.” (Carolyne
Forche)<br><br>
It is perhaps Darwish’s very special relationship to the Arabic language
that has set him apart from other Arab poets of his time. Putting the
political cause aside, a double-edged sword in the case of the poet’s
literary career, Darwish has created a new zone in the Arabic language
that he can call his own: he constructs his kingdom – homeland in
language. Considered by one prominent Arab literary critics as “the
saviour of the Arabic language,” Darwish manages to describe mundane
events and uncover his (and his people’s) innermost feelings through
words juxtaposed in the most idiosyncratic of contexts, creating
fascinating new images. The symbols, metaphors, and style in his poetry
are carefully chosen; yet at the same time they reflect an integrity and
clairvoyance that are a unique characteristic of this writer. A number of
his poems have even been called “prophetic.” With his artistic intuition
and acute political common sense, he manages to see and read what very
few people can. When that understanding finds its way into a poem, it
gains a totally new significance to the readers, because it usually is an
expression of what they fear most but are unable to utter.<br><br>
This is true of his character even in politics. In 1993, when Darwish
resigned from the PLO executive committee to protest the Oslo Accords, he
could see at the time, as very few people within the PLO could, that
there was a structural problem with the accord itself that would only
pave the way for escalation. “I hoped I was wrong. I’m very sad that I
was right.” (New York Times </i>interview) <br><br>
</i>His relationship to language remains unsurpassed by any relationship
he has with anyone or anything. Having a special talent for uncovering
and creating the music in language, his poetry has been a fertile ground
for musicians all over the Arab world to compose the most beautiful and
popular of songs. The fact that his words translate so easily and
splendidly into musical lyrics resulted in a wide array of beautiful
songs that are as much a credit to the poet as they are to the
musicians.<br><br>
Choosing to spend most of his time during the recent Palestinian Intifada
in Ramallah, under siege, Darwish wrote three extraordinary poems of
resistance slightly reminiscent of his early poetry. “Mohammad,” “ The
Sacrifice” and “A State of Siege” were published in newspapers in
Palestine and the Arab world during 2001 – 2002. The last one, “A State
of Siege,” is currently being published in a book in Arabic, to become
Darwish’s 21st</sup> book of poetry. In this last poem, he describes the
siege of Ramallah and the Palestinian land in profound images that invoke
daily life in a vivid and multi-layered way: <br><br>
<dl>
<dd>A woman asked the cloud: please enfold my loved one<br><br>
<dd>My clothes are soaked with his blood<br><br>
<dd>If you shall not be rain, my love<br><br>
<dd>Be trees<br><br>
<dd>Saturated with fertility, be trees<br><br>
<dd>And if you shall not be trees, my love<br><br>
<dd>Be a stone<br><br>
<dd>Saturated with humidity, be a stone<br><br>
<dd>And if you shall not be a stone, my love<br><br>
<dd>Be a moon<br><br>
<dd>In the loved one’s dream, be a moon<br><br>
<dd>So said a woman to her son<br><br>
<dd>In his funeral<br><br>
</i>
</dl>He goes on to add:<br><br>
<dl>
<dd><h3><b>During the siege, time becomes a space<br><br>
<br>
<dd>That has hardened in its eternity</b></h3>
<dd>During the siege, space becomes a time<br><br>
<dd>That is late for its yesterday and tomorrow<br><br>
</i>
<dd>(A State of Siege) <br><br>
</dl>Often called “the poet of the resistance,” and sometimes accused of
writing in defence of Palestinian mainstream politics, Darwish still
manages to constantly defy any strict definition of who and what he is or
wants to be. He wrote the Palestinian declaration of independence
in1988 and many poems of resistance that are an integral part of every
Arab’s consciousness. But he also wrote a lot about love and death; he
wrote poems that can be easily understood, and others that are so
mystifying that many critics could not begin to decipher. In all this, he
remains confident in his open and honest relationship to his readers.
“When I move closer to pure poetry, Palestinians say go back to what you
were. But I have learned from experience that I can take my reader with
me if he trusts me. I can make my modernity, and I can play my games if I
am sincere.” (New York Times </i>interview) </i>This intricate
relationship with his ever-increasing audience is best described in this
excerpt: <br><br>
<dl>
<dd>Whenever I search for myself I find the others<br><br>
<dd>And when I search for them<br><br>
<dd>I only find my alien self<br><br>
<dd>So am I the individual- crowd?<br><br>
</i>
<dd>(Mural)<br><br>
</dl>Darwish is the recipient of many international literary awards
including the Lotus prize in 1969, the Lenin prize in 1983, France’s
highest medal as Knight of Arts and Belles Lettres in 1997, and the
Moroccan Wissam of intellectual merit handed to him by King Mohammad VI
of Morocco. In 2001, he won the Lannan prize for cultural freedom. This
prize recognizes people whose extraordinary and courageous work
celebrates the human right to freedom of imagination, inquiry, and
expression. As defined by the foundation, cultural freedom is the right
of individuals and communities to define and protect valued and diverse
ways of life currently threatened by globalisation.<br><br>
His reputation all over the world as a highly esteemed poet and
individual is partly due to the fact that Mahmoud Darwish affirms an open
conception of what being an Arab is. Arab, to him, is not an identity
closed unto itself, but a pluralism totally open unto others. In his
oeuvres, he dialogues with a group of cultures (Canaanite, Hebrew, Greek,
Roman, Persian, Egyptian, Arab, French, English, Ottoman, Native
American) as well as with myths of the three monotheistic religions.
These dialogues create multiple layers within the poem that may be
difficult to appreciate unless the reader can develop a full
understanding of the “I”s and the “others” of the text.<br><br>
When Darwish gives a poetry reading anywhere in the Arab world, a rare
event, he easily draws thousands of people from all walks of life and
social classes. It is as if he has become a personal possession, a
national treasure, for every Arab, regardless of age, education,
background, nationality, or religion. Now in translation perhaps he will
also be embraced elsewhere in the world. No poet has been expropriated as
Mahmoud Darwish has been over the past thirty years. No one realizes this
more than him: <br><br>
<dl>
<dd>And history makes fun of its victims<br><br>
<dd>And its heroes<br><br>
<dd>Takes a look at them and passes by<br><br>
<dd>This sea is mine<br><br>
<dd>This moist air is mine<br><br>
<dd>And my name-<br><br>
<dd>Even if I spell it wrong on the coffin –<br><br>
<dd>Is mine<br><br>
<dd>As for me,<br><br>
<dd>Now that I am filled with all the possible<br><br>
<dd>Reasons for departure –<br><br>
<dd>I am not mine.<br><br>
<dd>I am not mine<br><br>
<dd>I am not mine…<br><br>
</i>
<dd>(Mural)<br><br>
</dl> <br>
Serene Huleileh. <br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
</b><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
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522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
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