Book Synopsis:
A deeply powerful collection of poems about life in Gaza by award-winning Palestinian poet, Mosab Abu Toha.
Barely 30 years old, Mosab Abu Toha was already a well-known poet when the current assault on Gaza began. After the Israeli army bombed his house, pulverising a library he had painstakingly built for community use, he and his family fled for their safety. Not for the first time in their lives.
Somehow, amid the chaos, Abu Toha kept writing poems. These are those poems. Uncannily clear, direct and beautifully tuned, they form one of the most astonishing works of art wrested from wartime. Here are directives for what to do in an air raid and lyrics about the poet’s wife, singing to his children to distract them. Huddled in the dark, Abu Toha remembers his grandfather’s oranges and his daughter’s joy in eating them. Here are poems to introduce readers to his extended family, some of them no longer with us.
Moving between glimpses of life in relative peacetime and absurdist poems about surviving in a barely liveable occupation, Forest of Noise invites a wide audience into an experience that defies the imagination ― even as it is watched live. This is an extraordinary and arrestingly whimsical book, that brings us indelible art in a time of terrible suffering.
Mosab Abu Toha, Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza, winner of the Palestine Book Award 2022 and the American Book Award 2023
My Review:
This book by award winning Palestinian poet @mosababutohapoet is hard hitting, emotional and very thought provoking. Through him we walk the streets of Gaza to see what life was like before the current assault on Gaza and what it’s like now. We experience what life is like for the survivors living with their memories of Gaza and the refugees who have fled from the bombardment.
I thought this was a very special book and I often found myself tearing up as I read. It’s awful to realise everything that people have suffered and continue to suffer as the assault continues. The poet doesn’t try to spare the readers feelings as he gives us a snapshot glimpse of life there and quite vivid descriptions of his experiences of war.
‘But of all things,
losing the only photo of my grandfather
under the rubble of my house
was a real disaster.’
‘Sir, we are not welcome anywhere.
Only cemeteries don’t mind our bodies.’
If you have any interest in the ongoing Gaza assault or wish to understand more about what is happening there then I urge you to read this book. If you just appreciate good, poignant poetry than I highly recommend this book
Huge thanks to @indie_thinking and @4thestatebooks for sending me a copy of this book.
About The Author:
MOSAB ABU TOHA is a Palestinian poet, short-story writer, and essayist from Gaza. His first collection of poetry, Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and won the Palestine Book Award, the American Book Award, and the Walcott Poetry Prize. Abu Toha is also the founder of the Edward Said Library in Gaza, which he hopes to rebuild. He recently won an Overseas Press Club Award for his “Letter from Gaza” columns for The New Yorker.
Over The Rainbow Blog 