We would like to solicit paper proposals for a MESA panel on Mahmoud Darwish’s poetry. The panel seeks to examine the complex connection between poetry, myth, religion and history in Darwish’s work. We are interested in papers that will situate his latter writing within his overall work and within modern Arabic poetry. Possible areas of explorations can include the reception of his poetry; global influences on his work; the articulation of community, home, memory in his poetry; the form and structure of his poems that incorporates the qasida, the epic, the prose-poem, the long poem and the lyric; or his prose work; Mahmoud Darwish’s portrayal of women. The two papers planned focus on the notion of the city in the writing of Darwish and the lyric modes in his poetry.

Please submit abstracts to organizers by February 4, 2004.

Organizers: Hala Nassar hala.nassar@yale.edu Najat Rahman: rahmannx@jmu.edu