The Poetry of Arab Women - A Contemporary Anthology
edited by Nathalie Handal

Arab women poets work within one of the oldest literary traditions in the world, yet they are virtually unknown in the West. Uniting Arab women poets from all over the Arab world and abroad - whatever their language, and whether they were born in an Arab country or in the diaspora - editor Nathalie Handal has put together an outstanding collection from North Africa, the Levant, and the Arabian Gulf, as well as Europe, the United States and Canada. This anthology introduces poets who write in Arabic, French, English, and Swedish, among them some of the twentieth century's most accomplished poets and today's most exciting new voices.

The introduction provides a historical overview for understanding contemporary Arab women's poetry, including the singularity as well as the shared trends and movements in the work of these poets.

Translated by distinguished translators and poets from around the world, The Poetry of Arab Women showcases the work of 82 poets, among them: Elmaz Abi-Nader, Fawziyya Abu-Khalid, Etel Adnan, 'Aisha Arnaout, Andree Chedid, Nada al-Hage, Hoda Hussein, Salma Khadra Jayyusi, Joanna Kadi, Fatma Kandil, Venus Khoury-Ghata, Nazik al-Mala'ika, Houda al-Na'mani, Lisa Suhair Majaj, Zakiyya Malallah, D.H.Melhem, Naomi Shihab Nye, Amina Said, Munia Samara, Lina Tibi and Fadwa Tuqan.

About the Author
Nathalie Handal divides her time between Boston and London, where she is a researcher in the English department at the University of London. She is the author of a book of poetry, The Never Field, and a poetry CD, Traveling Rooms.

Reviews
"Eighty-two Arab women poets from all over the world are gathered in this highly charged, stunning anthology. Editor Nathalie Handal has done an amazing job of presenting a massive body of work by a group of women poets who are hardly known on the international poetry stage…In the male dominated, global poetry community this struggle is endless, but poets like Elmaz Abi-Nader, Safaa Fathy, Dunya Mikhail, Amal Moussa, and Fatma Kandil continue to write, sing, and disrupt the status quo. Handal has organized the work of 40 translators who present outstanding English versions of poetry by women from Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine and 10 other countries. This book is a rich magnet from cultures whose women are some of the leading artists of a vibrant world."
–The Bloomsbury Review

"An extremely thorough collection…Handal’s introduction does an excellent job of setting the poems in context…The poets whose work appears here are largely excellent…I want to show this to everyone who regards Arabs as ‘those other people who aren’t like us.’…These are impressive poems, brave poems, diverse poems. And this is an impressive, brave and diverse book. Although I found it painful sometimes, I recommend it highly. No: maybe because I found it painful sometimes. This is a book that people need to read."
–Rachel Barenblatt, Pif Magazine