So What
"Taha Muhammad Ali speaks with an emotional forthrightness . . . . He has developed a style that seems both ancient and new, deceptively simply and movingly direct."—The Washington Post
"Bittersweet, powerful verse."—The New York Sun
"A Palestinian Muslim whose own village, Saffuriyya, was obliterated by Israel in 1948…and who has managed to distill from that devastating experience not slogans, not hatred, but art of the highest order."—The Boston Globe
"Timely and affecting."—Publishers Weekly
"He writes with the grace and forgiveness of an angel, the humanity of an everyman. Taha's poems speak the truth without a trace of rancor—with a trancendent hope for reconciliation and redemption."—"Staff Pick," Elliott Bay Book Company
"...Muhammad Ali writes unornamented verse that is as moving as it is witty and artfully understated; his humane, conversational tone gradually reveals much psychological and intellectual complexity....These images accurately depict disastrous daily scenes in the Territories, but their significance is all the more compelling because they at once pinpoint and transcend a particular time and place. The words are contemporary, but the tragedy is also very ancient."
—Antioch Review
"[Ali] creates art of the highest order. His poems portray experiences ranging from catastrophe to splendor, using a vivid imagination, disarming humor, and unflinching honesty."
—Translation Review (University of Texas at Dallas)
"That such wisdom, humour, compassion, tolerance and joy in life as rests at the heart of Ali's work can emerge from such defeating circumstances is testimony to the best in the human mind. He is an extraordinarily subtle poet....Most impressive is his ability to address serious issues in a tone which never rises to the rhetorical....Ali is a superb poet and prose writer whose ability to imagine the real and to render it in memorable lines is of a very rare kind."—The Penniless Press
"(Muhammad Ali') does not merely attempt to convey loss or exile to the reader, but through the honest narration of the story he guides the reader into a historical moment, where the reader is asked to participate....Despite the multiplicity of contradictory emotions and stories captured here, the one that looms largest is the affirmation of beauty and life."—Aljadid
"Ali's poems, each powerful in its own right, resonate most deeply when taken as a whole. When considered in such a gulp, recurring themes and images take on new dimensions."—Mya Guarnieri, The Electronic Intifada
So What
New and Selected Poems: 1971-2005
Read Selected Poems
$18.00
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