Mahmoud Darwish, 1941-2008

In Ha'aretz:

Mahmoud Darwish, the world's most recognized Palestinian poet, whose prose gave voice to the Palestinian experience of exile, occupation and infighting, died on Saturday in Houston, Texas. He was 67.

The predominant Palestinian poet, whose work has been translated into more than 20 languages and won numerous international awards, died following open heart surgery at a Houston hospital, said Nabil Abu Rdeneh, a spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Born to a large Muslim family in historical Palestine - now modern-day Israel - he emerged as a Palestinian cultural icon who eloquently described his people's struggle for independence, and as a vocal critic of both Israel and the Palestinians. He gave voice to the Palestinian dreams of statehood, crafted their declaration of independence and helped forge a Palestinian national identity. He felt the pulse of Palestinians in beautiful poetry. He was a mirror of the Palestinian society, said Ali Qleibo, a Palestinian anthropologist and lecturer in cultural studies at Al Quds University in Jerusalem.

Darwish first gained prominence in the 1960s with the publication of his first poetry collection, Bird without Wings. It included a poem ("Identity Card) that defiantly spoke in the first person of an Arab man giving his identity number - a common practice among Palestinians when dealing with Israeli authorities and Arab governments - and vowing to return to his land.

 

Comments

[Felix E F Larocca MD]

In memoriam

Record!
I am an Arab
And my identity card is number fifty thousand
I have eight children
And the nineth is coming after a summer
Will you be angry?

Record!
I am an Arab
Employed with fellow workers at a quarry
I have eight children
I get them bread
Garments and books
from the rocks..
I do not supplicate charity at your doors
Nor do I belittle myself at the footsteps of your chamber
So will you be angry?

Record!
I am an Arab
I have a name without a title
Patient in a country
Where people are enraged
My roots
Were entrenched before the birth of time
And before the opening of the eras
Before the pines, and the olive trees
And before the grass grew

My father.. descends from the family of the plow
Not from a privileged class
And my grandfather..was a farmer
Neither well-bred, nor well-born!
Teaches me the pride of the sun
Before teaching me how to read
And my house is like a watchman's hut
Made of branches and cane
Are you satisfied with my status?
I have a name without a title!

Record!
I am an Arab
You have stolen the orchards of my ancestors
And the land which I cultivated
Along with my children
And you left nothing for us
Except for these rocks..
So will the State take them
As it has been said?!

Therefore!
Record on the top of the first page:
I do not hate people
Nor do I encroach
But if I become hungry
The usurper's flesh will be my food
Beware..
Beware..
Of my hunger
And my anger!

by Mahmoud Darwish
1964

[saifedean]

I really wish Darwish was with us,
If only to eloquently express to me what I am feeling at this moment.

He was always the voice to which I could reliably turn to tell me how exactly I feel about anything.

The ultimate pain of his death was that it exposed to me that there is no one to turn to when such travesties befall me.

[Nikolai Nikola]

Of all the roles he occupied with regards to the Palestinian struggle, what I most relished was that when it came to poetry and the literary art in general, Israel had nothing to rival Darwish, who outdid its best efforts. And all the Israelis could do, mainly the right wingers, was sulk and call him an anti-Semite. This battle he won for the Palestinian people.

[saifedean]

Nikolai,

You're absolutely right. The "best" that Zionists could muster was the pathetic attempt to hide the genocidal nature of their despicable Zionist project behind some moral-relativist arty-farty nonsense literature that sought to equate the anguish of the murderer with the anguish of the murdered and conclude that "we are all at fault". They're fooling no one; except, of course, the disgusting garbage of the American literary world that wants nothing but an excuse for their financial, political, diplomatic and moral underwriting of the genocide of the Palestinians.

[aguy109]

"He felt the pulse of Palestinians in beautiful poetry:"The usurper's flesh will be my food"

Aside from the literary merits, It isn't pleasant hearing your enemy saying he plans to eat you, but its better than letting him actually do it.

[saifedean]

Aguy109,

Thank you for illustrating in this profoundly intelligent comment of yours the quintessential logic of Zionism:

You misinterpret a poetic image from a verse from a poem from 40 years ago in order to justify the continuing occupation, ethnic cleansing, persecution and murder of your disgusting Zionist project: "See, all the murder that Israel does is justified because some poet used an image that says that he doesn't like the people who kicked him out of his home! Support us as we murder more Palestinians out of their homes!"

All you need is to find one tiny shred of something that could possibly be misinterpreted as discomforting for you to justify to your sick self decades of continuous oppression of a complete people--most of which, incidentally, came before this poem was ever uttered.

[spgreenlaw]

He was one of the greatest poets of our time. He, his message, and his voice will be missed.

[Nikolai Nikola]

Aguy109,

Maybe you're not used to the exaggerated imagery of arabic poetry, but he didn't mean it literally. Or maybe you knew that but chose to misinterpret the line anyway.

[Tololy]

How do you mourn a poet as grand as Darwish?

You don't. You mourn the world without him.

Truly a sad loss for us all.

[Hektor Bim]

Why does it have to be a zero-sum game? How does one even rate poetry, much less poetry in different languages, in different circumstances, written by many, many different people?

It's nice to see at least some of his poetry in this thread to go along with the rants about Zionism.

[aguy109]

Saifedean,
Thank you for spelling out the mainstream Palestinian line of thought with such lucidity. While some readers here are convinced by your assertions, many others recognize it as a profoundly destructive world view thats leads nowhere.