A River Dies of Thirst

Translated by Ruth Padel

Diaries

'A person can only be born in one place. However, he may die several times elsewhere: in the exiles and prisons, and in a homeland transformed by occupation and oppression into a nightmare. Poetry is perhaps what teaches us to nurture the charming illusion: how to be reborn out of ourselves over and over again, and use words to construct a better world, a fictitious world that enables us to sign pact for a permanent and comprehensive peace ... with life.'

Mahmoud Darwish was one of the most acclaimed contemporary poets in the Arab world, and is often cited as the poetic voice of the Palestinian people. During the tumultuous summer of 2006, as Israel attacked Gaza and Lebanon, Darwish was in Ramallah.

He recorded his observations and feelings in writing included in A River Dies of Thirst, some of his last work. In this collection Darwish writes of love, loss, and the pain of exile in bittersweet poems and diary entries leavened with hope and joy.

'Lyrical, imagistic, plaintive, haunting, always passionate and elegant and never anything less than free.' Naomi Shihab Nye

'These translations sway delicately between mystery and clarity, giving a rendition of the master's voice.' The Guardian

'Rarely have the personal and the political been so plainly intertwined as in Darwish's poetry, and this book is no exception.' The Bloomsbury Review

'Mahmoud Darwish is one of the greatest poets of our time. In his poetry Palestine becomes the map of the human soul.' Elias Khoury

'There are two maps of Palestine that politicians will never manage to forfeit: the one kept in the memories of Palestinian refugees, and that which is drawn by Darwish's poetry.' Anton Shammas