Mahmoud Darwish and a Poet's role in war and the fear of existence. (Disappearance) Poetry is Literary work in which the expression of feelings and ideas is given intensity by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature.  In this powerpoint, Darwish's perception of poetry will be discussed, as well as quotations from his writing "Memory for Forgetfulness" will be analyzed and interpreted .

1. A POET’S ROLE IN A WAR AND THE
FEAR OF EXISTENCE
(DISAPPEARANCE?)

2. WHAT IS POETRY
Literary work in which the expression
of feelings and ideas is given intensity
by the use of distinctive style and
rhythm; poems collectively or as a
genre of literature.

3. ACCORDING TO DARWISH
Poetry: any communication resembling poetry in beauty or the
evocation of feeling.
Darwish (1993): A poem exists only in the relation between poet and
reader. And I'm in need of my readers, except that they never cease
to write me as they would wish, turning their reading into another
writing that almost rubs out my features. I don't know why my poetry
has to be killed on the altar of misunderstanding or the fallacy of
ready-made intent. I am not solely a citizen of Palestine, though I am
proud of this affiliation and ready to sacrifice my life in defending the
radiance of the Palestinian fact, but I also want to take up the history
of my people and their struggle from an aesthetic angle that differs
from the prevalent and repeatable meanings readily available from an
unmediated political reading.

4. FALLACY
A misconception resulting from incorrect reasoning.

5. INTENT
The intended meaning of a communication. In this case, as the reader
tries to interpret the writer's (Darwish) work, despite what he actually
tries to convey.

6. AESTHETIC
Adjective : concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty.
Noun: Aesthetics, also spelled "esthetics", the philosophical study of beauty
and taste. It is closely related to the philosophy of art, which is concerned
with the nature of art and the concepts in terms of which individual works of
art are interpreted and evaluated.
Concepts of modern literary theory: representation, expression, form, style,
and sentimentality.
The study invariably has a dual purpose: to show how (if at all) these
descriptions might be justified and to show what is distinctive in the human
experiences that are expressed in them.

7. UNMEDIATED
Having no intervening persons, agents or conditions.

8. ACCORDING TO DARWISH
Poetry: any communication resembling poetry in beauty or the
evocation of feeling.
Darwish (1993): A poem exists only in the relation between poet and
reader. And I'm in need of my readers, except that they never cease
to write me as they would wish, turning their reading into another
writing that almost rubs out my features. I don't know why my poetry
has to be killed on the altar of misunderstanding or the fallacy of
ready-made intent. I am not solely a citizen of Palestine, though I am
proud of this affiliation and ready to sacrifice my life in defending the
radiance of the Palestinian fact, but I also want to take up the history
of my people and their struggle from an aesthetic angle that differs
from the prevalent and repeatable meanings readily available from an
unmediated political reading.

9. SUMMARY OF MEMORY FOR
FORGETFULNESS
Memory for forgetfulness is a collection of essays—really, a set of prose
poems—reflects on Darwish’s experience during the 1982 Israeli invasion
of Lebanon. In a meditative rendering, the collection touches upon the
political and historical dimensions of the Palestinian exile, and particularly
on “Hiroshima Day” during the Lebanese Civil War: witnessing the barrage
of Beirut in August of 1982. Through recurring symbols of death, coffee,
wakefulness, and memory, Darwish explores fear during conflict: a
sentiment which is, as he recounts, constant, pervasive, and disturbingly
routine.
The essays are war-ravaged, recreating the violence of a city under siege
from behind Darwish’s kitchen window. It is hauntingly mundane,
illustrating a ‘day-in-the-life’ of an individual during wartime; as he
yearns for his coffee, his “morning silence,” (7), he evaluates whether the
walls of his home will protect him from the bombshells. As he listens to
the morning birds, awake at daybreak, he wonders “for whom do they sing
in the crush of these rockets?” (9). Thoughts of death for Darwish, for a
man encumbered by the normalization of war, are thoughts as
commonplace as his morning coffee, as the 6am bird songs. It is this
normalization - the disturbing interweaving of uncertain death among

10. PAGE 13
"“The poet is dead, and his poetry with him. What’s left of him? His role is
finished, and we’re done with his legend. He took his poetry with him and
disappeared. Anyway, his nose was long, and his tongue.”
I’ll hear even harsher stuff than this, once the imagination has been let loose. I’ll
smile in my coffin and try to say, “Enough!” I’ll try to come back to life, but I
won’t be able."
Defintions:
Legend: a traditional story sometimes popularly regarded as historical but not
authenticated.

11. PAGE
"The corpse consumes itself by means of a well-organized army rising
from within
it in moments. Surely, it’s a picture that empties a man of heroism and
flesh, thrusting
him into the nakedness of absurd destiny, into absolute absurdity, into
total nothingness;
a picture that peels the song from the praise of death and from the
escape into flight. Was
it to overcome the ugliness of this fact that the human imagination—the
inhabitant of the
corpse—opened a space to save the spirit from this nothingness? Is this
the solution
proposed by religion and poetry? Perhaps. Perhaps."