Trying Again to Stop Time - Selected Poems

"Jalal Barzanji chronicles the path of exile and estrangement from his beloved native Kurdistan to his chosen home in Canada. His poems speak of the tension that exists between the place of one's birth and an adoptive land, of that delicate dance that happens in the face of censorship and oppression. In defiance of Saddam Hussein's call for sycophantic political verse, he turns to the natural world to reference a mournful state of loss, longing, alienation, and melancholy. Barzanji's poetry is infused with the richness of the Middle East, but underlying it all is a close affinity to Western Modernists. In those moments where language and culture collide and co-operate, Barzanji carves out a strong voice of opposition to political oppression." --Publisher's description.

About the author

Jalal Barzanji is a highly respected Kurdish poet and journalist. He has published seven books of poetry and numerous critical columns. After his two-year imprisonment by Saddam Hussein's regime in the late 1980s and further political repression into the 1990s, Barzanji and his family fled to Turkey. They remained there for eleven months, eventually immigrating to Canada. Sabah A. Salih is Professor of English at Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania.

Summary

Dream-like cadences of international landscapes, human desire, and visions of a loving and wounded poet.

Product details

• Authors: Jalal Barzanji
• Assisted by: Dr. Sabah A. Salih (Translation), Sabah A. Salih (Translation)
• Publisher: University of Alberta Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 18.02.2015
• EAN: 9781772120431
• ISBN: 978-1-77212-043-1
• No. of pages: 148
• Dimensions: 135 mm x 230 mm x 15 mm
• Weight: 208 g
• Series: Robert Kroetsch Series; Robert Kroetsch Series; Robert Kroetsch
• Subjects: Fiction > Poetry, drama; Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies