Copper Canyon Press is pleased to announce the publication of So What: New and Selected Poems, 1971-2005, by Palestinian poet Taha Muhammad Ali. This book, presented in a bilingual Arabic-English format, is a crucial piece of contemporary Middle Eastern culture, and an important book for American readers. Forced into exile after the Arab-Israeli war in 1948, Muhammad Ali does not rely on simple slogan poetry, but instead draws on his experience to create, as The Boston Globe puts it, “art of the highest order.”

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“This bilingual book of verse will bring a wider readership to a major Palestinian poet. As befits a poet from a war-torn land, Ali portrays bloodshed and violence in much of his work . . . Ali's verse abounds with striking metaphors. Home and land are revered by a writer torn from both: ‘with all my heart I would have agreed, / to swallow a rope longer than Sabha’s / if only / we could have stayed in our village.’ At his best, Ali guides us through the darkness of war and loss . . . finely crafted and lyrically intense.”—Library Journal

Taha Muhammad Ali will be on tour across the United States in the Fall of 2006. Dates and locations:

September 28–October 1 Dodge Poetry Festival Stanhope, New Jersey October 3, 7:00 pm Poets House New York City, NY October 5, 3:30 & 7:30 pm Poetry Center San Franciso State University San Francisco, CA October 7, 7:30 pm St. Mark’s Cathedral Seattle, WA

October 8, 7:00 pm Wheeler Theater Fort Worden State Park Port Townsend, WA October 11, 7:00 pm Chapters Bookstore at Washington, D.C. Taha Muhammad Ali reads at the 2002 Geraldine R. Dodge poetry festival. Photo Credit: David Mayhew.

Click here to download a printable tour flyer with tour dates and locations.

Taha Muhammad Ali is a self-taught wonder, a man who sold souvenirs during the day and who, at night, studied classical Arabic texts, American fiction, English Romantic poets, Chekov, and Maupassant. Born in Saffuryia, the Galilean village at the heart of his poems, Taha and his family escaped to Lebanon during the Arab-Israeli War. He returned a year later to live in Nazareth, one painful mile away from the ruins of his former village.       A relative latecomer to poetry, Muhammad Ali has published short stories since the 1950s in Arabic and Hebrew publications. Now, having presented his poetry at the Jerusalem International Poetry Festival, the Geraldine R. Dodge Festival, and at

colleges and universities across the United States, Taha Muhammad Ali is a beloved Palestinian poet. Audiences around the world have been powerfully moved by Muhammad Ali’s poems of political complexity, bittersweet humor, and—above all—humanity. Muhammad Ali has turned over the management of his souvenir shop, near the Church of the Annunciation, to his sons and spends his days writing, traveling, and conversing with friends over Turkish coffee. ——— Related Links: · Biography from Poetry International Web · New York State Writers Institute ———

So What: New and Selected Poems, 1971-2005 presents the essential poems from one of one of the most important contemporary Palestinian poets. The village of Muhammad Ali’s childhood—destroyed in the Arab-Israeli War—serves as the nexus of his work, which is grounded in everyday experience and driven by a storyteller’s vivid imagination. The 34 poems and one short story (the first short story ever published by Copper Canyon Press) bring to the forefront the politically complex and sensitive work of a poet bridging the barriers between English, Hebrew, and Arabic-speaking nations.		Where Poetry hides somewhere behind the night of words behind the clouds of hearing, across the dark of sight, and beyond the dusk of music that’s hidden and revealed. But where is it concealed? And how could I possibly know when I am barely able, by the light of day, to find my pencil?
Click here to read more poem samples, reviews, and purchase the book. “Timely and affecting.”—Publishers Weekly “Bittersweet, powerful verse.”—The New York Sun “Taha Muhammad Ali speaks with an emotional forthrightness. . . . He has developed a style that seems both ancient and new, deceptively simple and movingly direct.”—The Washington Post “Tales of perseverence and wile, the basic ingredients of survival.”—Arab Studies Journal

Copper Canyon Press seeks to build the awareness of, appreciation of, and audience for a wide range of emerging and established American poets, as well as poetry in translation from many of the world’s cultures, classical and contemporary. Click here to visit our main web site.


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