Incomprehensible Lesson

Fawzi Karims poetry has been widely translated, among other languages into French, Swedish, Italian and English. Carcanet published The Plague Lands and Other Poems (2011), which was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. This new selection, translated by Anthony Howell working from the authors own versions, explores the experience of becoming at home in London, passing from a sense of exile to a sense of uneasy belonging. In his introduction the poet is tactful, candid, touching on some of the most urgent themes of our time including exile and the possibilities of home. Between the poet, a major literary presence in his language, and his translator, a poet of many talents and skills, a kind of dialogue exists. The accommodations between two traditions formally uneasy in one anothers company is compelling to read. The poets and the translators contrasting memories meet and confer at the level of language and image.