{"id":11750,"date":"2014-03-13T16:08:55","date_gmt":"2014-03-13T20:08:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/?p=11750"},"modified":"2014-03-13T09:33:13","modified_gmt":"2014-03-13T13:33:13","slug":"mahmoud-darwish-born-on-this-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/mahmoud-darwish-born-on-this-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Mahmoud Darwish, born on this day…"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
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\"DarwishPassport\"<\/a><\/p>\n

… in 1941., as\u00a0lynxqualey<\/a>\u00a0<\/b><\/i>reminds us on Arab Literature (in English)<\/a>, going on to note that:<\/p>\n

Eleven cities around Italy are remembering his work today<\/i><\/a>, keeping it in the light, and (virtually)\u00a0we join them.<\/i><\/p>\n

& then quotes “from Ibrahim Muhawi’s wonderful translation of Darwish’s Journal of an Ordinary Grief<\/i><\/a>:<\/p>\n

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Tonight is your birthday: the thirteenth of March. And you want an occasion to wrest a deceptive happiness from the grim days. You gather your friends. You conspire against sadness with cups and music and cutting jokes. The music gets louder and you dance. The laughter of the girls reaches the neighbors\u2019 windows. At midnight a policeman arrives. He checks identities and threatens arrest. Be civilized. Enough barbarism. You ask him why, and he says the neighbors had called, to keep the building quiet. You say, \u201cIt\u2019s a birthday,\u201d and he answers, \u201cThat\u2019s no concern of mine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oh my good neighbors! Why didn\u2019t you warn me that my happiness gives you pain? And why does the music you play, which is made from my blood, pour into my windows every night with no complaint from me? When are you going to get out of my craw, O neighbors? When?<\/p>\n

When you go to bed you reach the conclusion that the neighbors were right. In the morning you apologize: \u201cI have no right to celebrate as long as I am your neighbor. Forgive me, O neighbors!\u201d I repent for celebrating.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Also remember:<\/b><\/p>\n

With “Standing Before the Ruins of Al-Birweh<\/a>,” trans. Sinan Antoon. Darwish was born in al-Birweh, which was occupied and depopulated seven years later.<\/p>\n

An interview with Raja Shehadeh, in which Darwish said<\/a>: “For gaining in experience and furthering one\u2019s knowledge, the city is the better locale, but for getting on with the writing process the village has fewer distractions. The smaller the place the better for writing. In my house the room I write in is the smallest in the house.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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The same site has also now reported that ”\u00a0All of Mahmoud Darwish\u2019s Books Removed from Riyadh Book\u00a0Fair<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Just a few days after all the works by Saudi publisher\u00a0<\/i>Arab Network for Research and Publishing were removed from the Riyadh International Book Fair<\/i><\/a> for violating the Kingdom’s laws, the works of globally celebrated Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish caused protests and <\/i>have reportedly been withdrawn from the fair and are not to be sold<\/a>…<\/i>
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Numerous news sources<\/a> reported the removal of the books, while images and videos circulating on Twitter purported to show the protests against Darwish’s ouevre<\/a> as well as the packing-up of Darwish’s books<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The order was reportedly given Wednesday to remove Darwish’s books from the fair after protestors objected to alleged blasphemy found in his works. A large crowd gathered, and security reportedly had to be called in. After that, the PVPV ordered the books removed.<\/p>\n

This came not long after the\u00a0Arab Network for Research and Publishing<\/a>\u00a0stall was removed from the fair, and all the house’s books confiscated. In response to the seizure, Saudi\u00a0Minister of Culture and Information Dr. Abdulaziz Khoja released a statement that said, in part, “the Kingdom\u2019s security is more important than anything, and trying to destabilize our unity can not be tolerated.”<\/p>\n

Reaction to the seizure of Darwish’s books on Twitter<\/a> ranged from cynical to furious. Saudi-based\u00a0Redha Al-boori (@Redha_ph<\/a>) wrote “Haha irony, I saw Dawkins’s books being sold there… they left them and went afetr Darwish’s books….”<\/p>\n

\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

… in 1941., as\u00a0lynxqualey\u00a0reminds us on Arab Literature (in English), going on to note that: Eleven cities around Italy are remembering his work today, keeping it in the light, and (virtually)\u00a0we join them. &...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,79,91,103],"tags":[500],"class_list":["post-11750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arab-culture","category-palestine","category-poetry","category-translation","tag-mahmoud-darwish"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11750"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11754,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11750\/revisions\/11754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}