Revolution goes through walls

Poetry. Middle Eastern Studies. Translated by Pierre Joris. REVOLUTION GOES THROUGH WALLS was first published in Arabic by Sharkyat in 2014. Tarabuste Editions published a French edition, Révolution traverse des murs, translated into French by Hélène Nancy, Hedi Djebnoun, and Jean-Pierre Daumard, with a preface by Jean-Luc Nancy, in 2017. Portuguese and German editions are forthcoming.


"It is a story of walls. They bar the way, resist, stand against. But they have fissures too. And one also can stick photos placards graphs poems screams on them."--Jean-Luc Nancy



"Revolutions threaten poetry with loss of the intimate and the aesthetic. Safaa delves into this threat head-on in order to produce a book that is both beautiful and intimate, where the revolution becomes the daily gesture: 'when the tear gas entered my lungs, I decided to start smoking again.' This book doubles as an elegy for Safaa's brother Mohammad, lost to kidney illness and dialysis machines, and whom she glimpses reflected in the revolution martyrs he might have joined. But the poet declares that she doesn't know the road to 'paradise' and cannot guide Mohammad or the marchers. When the world gave up on the notion of revolution, the Tunisians and Egyptians filled the streets to revive it. REVOLUTION GOES THROUGH THE WALLS is political poetry at its best, intimate telling. Where a poet doesn't scream her revolt, she murmurs it."--Maged Zaher