Winner of the prestigious Naguib Mahfouz Medal, this fierce and moving work is an unparalleled rendering of the human aspects of the Palestinian predicament.

Barred from his homeland after 1967’s Six-Day War, the poet Mourid Barghouti spent thirty years in exile—shuttling among 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 home for the first time since the Israeli occupation, Barghouti crosses a wooden bridge over the Jordan River into Ramallah and is unable to recognize the city of his youth. Sifting through memories of the old Palestine as they come up against what he now encounters in this mere “idea of Palestine,” he discovers what it means to be deprived not only of a homeland but of “the habitual place and status of a person.” A tour de force of memory and reflection, lamentation and resilience, I Saw Ramallah is a deeply humane book, essential to any balanced understanding of today’s Middle East.

作者簡介

巴爾古提

阿拉伯世界知名詩人。

1944年生於約旦河西岸，巴勒斯坦詩人與作家，小時住在戴爾．格薩那，後因求學之故，全家移居拉姆安拉。1967年以巴六日戰爭後，當時在開羅讀書的他，因而不能回到約旦河西岸，開始了三十年的流亡生涯。1977年自埃及被驅逐出境，1995年才能正常進出開羅機場。自1972年起，他的詩集即已在開羅、安曼等地出版，並曾被譯為多國語言，也在《泰晤士文學評論》等知名媒體刊登。最新一冊詩集為2005年出版的《午夜》（Muntasaf al-Lail）。現居開羅，本書於1997年出版時獲得馬富茲文學獎（Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature），該獎為阿拉伯文學界的重要獎項，作者並於2000年獲巴勒斯坦詩獎（Palestine Award for Poetry）。

譯者簡介

陳逸如

台北人，目前居住於紐約，攻讀比較文學博士。曾任教師與編輯，譯有《失敗萬歲》﹝立緒﹞等社會人文類書籍。