Customer Reviews

Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature

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I am an Israeli and an artist. I found this literature to be eye-opening, and very very deep. I appreciate very much the time that was spent by Palestinians to tell their experiences. Perhaps, if we listened more to the artists, peace would could come sooner. Art reflects truth, after all.

Excellent! For so many decades, the oppression of Palestinians has gone unnoticed. This anthalogy allows Palestinians to tell their story through profound creativity. It is heart-wrenching and kudos to all the writers for capturing the pain of the Palestinian people during the last 53 years. The Oslo Accords never helped liberate Palestinians, and today's uprising for freedom against Israeli occupation illustrates the desires as represented in these creative works.

If you don't have time to read the full painful historical account of the Palestinian exodus from Palestine during Israel's creation, or want to get a better idea as to why Palestinians have launched the current uprising, I highly recommend this. History isn't always pretty, and undoubtedly, these heart-felt writings will not sit well with pro-Israelis and Zionists. But these writings tell people's personal stories. Nobody can argue with a person's feelings or personal experiences. And nobody can take them away, no matter how inconvenient they may seem to others.

A must-have anthology - to those interested in Palestine and the Arab lands, and to those interested in literature and poetry.

A powerful and moving anthology!

As a Jew and a poet, I find it sad that the work represented here is largely militant and hateful. Except for the magnificent poems of Sharif Elmusa, much of the work refers to Israelis and Jews as locusts, occupiers, enemies, murderers and worse.

The existence of Israel, established under the international law by the United Nations in 1948, is seen as "the catastrophe" and the writers almost unanimously hope, obliquely or otherwise, for its destruction. Those who have fought to that end are "martyrs."

To be fair, much of this work was written before the establishment of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in 1993. Yet the introduction to the paperback edition, published in 1994, makes no mention of that process. On the contrary, the editor lauds writers who have worked for "the cause" ---including those who refuse to live in states at peace with Israel. Arab writers even now take a hard line. An Israeli poet reports that despite peace with Jordan and Egypt, Arab writers in those countries theaten to ban anyone who contacts their Israeli counterparts. Thus, virtually no dialogue has developed, even among the writing communities.

What can one say, after reading such work and learning such things? One hopes for a true and lasting peace, but if the literature is any evidence, it will be at best years before such a peace is forthcoming.

---Alyssa A. Lappen