I Saw Ramallah - Outside of a Dog

Paperback, 252 pages

Published Dec. 18, 2024 by Daunt Books.

ISBN:: 9781917092043

No rating (1 review)

A fierce and moving memoir on returning to Palestine, the meaning of exile and homeland, and the habitual place and status of a person, from the late Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti.

Barred from his homeland after 1967’s Six-Day War, Barghouti spent thirty years in exile: shuttling between the world’s cities, yet secure in none of them; separated from his family for years at a time; never certain whether he was a visitor, a refugee, a citizen, or a guest.

As he returns to Ramallah for the first time since the Israeli occupation, crossing a wooden bridge over the Jordan River, Barghouti is unable to recognise the city of his youth. He discovers how the joy of return and reunion is accompanied by a feeling of insurmountable loss.

A tour de force of memory, reflection and resilience, I Saw Ramallah is deeply humane and is essential to any balanced understanding of …

A fierce and moving memoir on returning to Palestine, the meaning of exile and homeland, and the habitual place and status of a person, from the late Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti.

Barred from his homeland after 1967’s Six-Day War, Barghouti spent thirty years in exile: shuttling between the world’s cities, yet secure in none of them; separated from his family for years at a time; never certain whether he was a visitor, a refugee, a citizen, or a guest.

As he returns to Ramallah for the first time since the Israeli occupation, crossing a wooden bridge over the Jordan River, Barghouti is unable to recognise the city of his youth. He discovers how the joy of return and reunion is accompanied by a feeling of insurmountable loss.

A tour de force of memory, reflection and resilience, I Saw Ramallah is deeply humane and is essential to any balanced understanding of today’s Middle East.

Forward by Edward Said. Translated from Arabic by Ahdaf Soueif.

2 editions

Jim Brown reviewed I saw Ramallah by Murīd Barghūthī

Palestine is not an abstraction

No rating

This book is about a Palestinian coming to terms with what happens when he is able to return to the land he was driven from. We see the distinction between his idea of Palestine and his encounter with the place and his people. Barghouti's life is upended in every way when he is forced into exile at various moments (from Palestine, from Egypt, constantly forced to move and migrate) - this transforms his relationships to people, to place, even to things. The book shows the ripple effects of Zionism, and it is written by a poet, so we are immersed in these problems in an intense way

Subjects

Travel
Description and travel
Political and social views
West bank
Middle east, description and travel
Palestinian arabs