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Through vivid vignettes and lyrical prose, The Iron Grasshopper transcends memoir, immersing readers in the poignant and turbulent realities of a Kurdish childhood in mid-twentieth-century Syria.    Kurdish-Syrian poet and novelist Salim Barakat, one of the most distinctive writers in contemporary Arabic literature, has mesmerized the Arab literary scene since his first volume of poetry appeared in 1972. Now, his unique memoir-first published in 1980-is finally available in English translation.    In The Iron Grasshopper, Barakat offers a poignant and evocative portrayal of his childhood. Set against the backdrop of the mid-twentieth century, Barakat's memoir recounts his formative years in a small town near the Taurus Mountains. Through a series of vivid and often unsettling vignettes, he captures the turbulence and wonder of growing up in a landscape marked by political upheaval, cultural conflicts, and personal discovery. Barakat's story intertwines childhood innocence with the harsh realities of violence and discrimination against Kurds, shaping his relationship with his homeland, the Arabic language, and his identity as a writer. The memoir's rich prose and lyrical reflections invite readers into Barakat's inner world, where the boundaries between past and present blur, and the simplicity of childhood is juxtaposed with profound existential musings.

Three plays that seamlessly blend the ageless with the contemporary. Chandrasekhar Kambar, recognized as one of the most progressive and influential playwrights in modern Indian theatre, masterfully transforms traditional religious and folk motifs to deliver a strikingly contemporary message. This volume brings together three of Kambar's seminal plays from the previous century. In Jokumaraswami, a phallic fertility god worshipped in Karnataka is identified with Basanna, a fearless peasant who defies a tyrannical feudal lord with tragic consequences, embodying the myth of the god in his own heroic journey. Samba Shiva is a lively, rambunctious farce filled with bawdy humor and hilarious situations. Everything is turned on its head: men become women, gods step down from their pedestals out of boredom, kings turn into donkeys, and donkeys into ministers. This acerbic comedy savagely satirizes bureaucracies, hierarchies, and the establishment at large. In Siri Sampige, an ominous prophecy looms over a brave, handsome young prince, the sole heir to the kingdom of Shivapura. An oracle warns that as the prince steps into manhood, he will either become a wandering ascetic or die due to "one who is heir to what he is heir to." The queen mother attempts to thwart this fate by arranging his marriage to the beautiful princess Siri Sampige, but destiny's coils tighten, and the prince is ensnared in his foretold fate.

Showcases influential Iranian plays translated into English for the first time, offering a rich tapestry of Iran's vibrant post-revolutionary theater scene. 'Oblivion' and Other Plays from Post-Revolutionary Iran presents significant Iranian plays written between 1998 and 2019, a period during which the nation experienced a vibrant resurgence in its theatrical output. Featuring five plays from some of Iran's most prominent and influential playwrights, collected here for the first time in English translation, this anthology illustrates a wide range of performance practices and theatrical modalities that are emblematic of Iran's post-revolutionary theatrical scene. Highlighting themes of cultural identity, social issues, and women's narratives, the plays are presented here alongside historical and cultural contexts to expand and inform their global audiences. This collection features an array of works that meld the past and present as well as the East and the West. Plays such as The Sacrifice of Senemar (Bahram Beyzaie) and Oblivion (Hamid Amjad) infuse Western dialogic theater with the Persian indigenous performance practices of ta'ziyeh, shadow puppetry, and naqqali. The pieces Bird of Dawn (Sepideh Khosrowjah) and The Child (Naghmeh Samini) center women's narratives and discussions of diasporic belonging and allyship, while The Dance of Mares (Mohammad Charmshir) reimagines Federico García Lorca's Yerma through surrealism and an abstract episodic structure. Together, these plays showcase the diversity of Iranian contemporary theater, reflecting Persian cultural identity and a blend of indigenous traditions with European and global dramatic influences.

Exploring the ethics of historical narratives and national identities, this anthology of Polish plays delves into the trauma of war, anti-Semitism, the Holocaust, and Poland's post-communist reality. The eleven pieces in this anthology of Polish plays dive deep into complex subjects such as Poland's loss since the Holocaust, its difficult postwar relations with Germany, the social metamorphoses since the political upheaval of 1989, and the needs of Polish families and youth since the nation's transition to a free-market economy. Krzysztof Warlikowski's acclaimed production (A)pollonia, which calls upon excerpts from Greek tragedies, novels by Jonathan Littell and J. M. Coetzee, and reportage by Hanna Krall, provides the title for the anthology as it encapsulates the key subjects, conflicts, and dilemmas prominent in the Polish theater of the last decade. The plays in this anthology are accompanied by thirty-five black-and-white photographs of performances showcasing select scenes from their original Polish productions. An introduction provides the historical and political framework for the collected texts, and the foreword explains the scope of the international collaboration that produced the exceptional translations in this volume.

Word-pictures crafted by a master artist from everyday moments offer deep reflections on contemporary existence in this poem collection. I lie and lay my head upon the grass And unwind the body hardened stiff like glass. But the tiny blades tickle the lower ear Making me ask myself, why do I bear This crass impertinence and sink my head Still further down its bed of prickly green? So asks the poet, his ears pressed against the earth as he maps the world around him in a new geography of sound. Places, photographs, books, neighbors, afternoons, love, loss, and longing are sketched into word-pictures by Subramanyan as he reflects, reacts, and reminisces in this collection of poems. These memoir-poems will help throw into relief some of Subramanyan's symbols and motifs, better contextualizing his oeuvre.

From one of India's best-known artists, an inspired exploration of China's cities and small towns and villages, highlighting landscapes and everyday life. In 1985, K. G. Subramanyan visited China on an invitation from the China Artists Association, exploring Beijing, the Dunhuang caves, Xinjiang, Shaanxi, and Guangdong. Rather than its old monuments and new cities, what caught his eye were China's landscapes and the quotidian scenes of life in its small towns and villages. During his travels, he preferred to make visual impressions rather than elaborate drawings. Upon returning to Santiniketan, he used those visual notes to produce a large body of ink works on card-sized handmade paper, as well as a few paintings, registering his recollections with precise calligraphic economy. This volume brings together a number of these drawings and paintings along with Subramanyan's writings on China, giving us a rare insight into this cross-cultural interaction.

A collection of letters discussing the role of the state in the preservation and promotion of art and culture, by one of India's greatest artists. The seventeen letters in this collection were written by K.G. Subramanyan in response to requests from "various quarters" about matters ranging from the National Policy of Education to the government's seeming preference for erecting statues of dead men and organizing grand Republic Day parades rather than for preserving the myriad threads of cultural tradition and ensuring the survival of the Indian value system against the onslaught of a "Western" lifestyle. As Subramanyan writes in his preface, although he has no proof that any of his views and suggestions translated into practice, the very writing of them was, for him, a process of thinking through a range of issues that pertain not merely to art and aesthetics but to life itself.

A vital addition to Seagull's growing Italian List that focuses on leftist Italian thought, bringing famous as well as little-known yet crucial voices into the English language. As speaking animals, we continuously make use of an unassuming grammatical particle, without suspecting that what is at work in its inconspicuousness is a powerful apparatus, which orchestrates language, signification, and the world at large. What particle might this be? The word not. In Essay on Negation, Paolo Virno argues that the importance of the not is perhaps comparable only to that of money--that is, the universality of exchange. Negation is what separates verbal thought from silent cognitive operations, such as feelings and mental images. Speaking about what is not happening here and now, or about properties that are not referable to a given object, the human animal deactivates its original neuronal empathy, which is prelinguistic; it distances itself from the prescriptions of its own instinctual endowment and accesses a higher sociality, negotiated and unstable, which establishes the public sphere. In fact, the speaking animal soon learns that the negative statement does not amount to the linguistic double of unpleasant realities or destructive emotions: while it rejects them, negation also names them and thus includes them in social life. Virno sees negation as a crucial effect of civilization, one that is, however, also always exposed to further regressions. Taking his cue from a humble word, the author is capable of unfolding the unexpected phenomenology of the negating consciousness.

A vivid and unforgettable novelistic portrait of rural Italy, exploring the nature of reality and the human condition.   A small-time farmer living in central Italy in the 1960s is the keeper of a great truth: that people are machines built by other beings who are machines themselves. Our true destiny is to build ever better machines so that society can become a techno-utopia in which friendship can be established among all people on earth. These ideas bring him into conflict with everyone, especially his wife, against whom he is accused of ill-treatment. His quest takes him to Rome, where he presents his truth, hoping it will bring him worldwide recognition. Behind his poetical reveries and unfathomable scientific notions lies the disturbing fragility of a lone, paranoid, and deluded man in conflict with everyone, including himself.   Paolo Volponi's unique novel The World Machine examines the relationship between rural life and the modern city, as well as the subversive idealism of a society still firmly anchored in the past, dominated by the Church, and unable to grasp the need for change.

A hilarious and absurdist take on the political landscape of West Bengal, India. Beggar's Bedlam is a surreal novel that unleashes the chaos of the carnival on the familiar. Part literary descendent of Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita and part a reconstruction of lost Bengali history, Nabarun Bhattacharya's masterpiece is a jubilant, fizzing wire of subaltern anarchy and insurrection.   Marshall Bhodi Sarkar and his lieutenant Sarkhel surreptitiously dig on the banks of the Ganges River looking for crude oil reserves. Instead, they unearth curved daggers, rusty broadswords, and a Portuguese cannon. Bhodi is an occasional military man and the lead sorcerer of the secret black-magic sect named Choktar. He joins forces with the flying Flaperoos-men with a predilection for alcohol and petty vandalism-to declare outright war against the Marxist-Leninist West Bengal government. In a bloodless revolution that is fascinating in its utter implausibility, a motley crew of yet more implausible characters come together in a magic-realist fictional remapping of Calcutta.

"A longboat plummets over the Great Falls, drowning the five passengers on board. The Lockmaster, the heir to an ancient title and responsible for guiding river traffic safely around this natural barrier on the White River, ought to have prevented this tragedy. His son is convinced that it was not an accident. Is his irascible father a murderer? A hydraulic engineer all too familiar with the brute force of rivers, he sets out to discover the truth and find his missing father."

After committing an irreparable crime, the narrator of The Emperor waits in his bedroom for the police to arrest him. His past reverberates inside of him like a drum: his youth spent in captivity as a zonbi, under the control of a charlatan Vodou leader, and many an alienating dawn delivering the daily newspaper through the cutthroat neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. He now has blood on his hands because of the woman on the bus--the only woman he had ever loved.

A brief study of select Western art from Italy's foremost philosopher. In Renaissance palaces, the studiolo was a small room to which the prince withdrew to meditate or read, surrounded by paintings he particularly loved. This book is a kind of studiolo for its author, Giorgio Agamben, as he turns his philosophical lens on the world of Western art. Studiolo is a fascinating take on a selection of artworks created over millennia; some are easily identifiable, others rarer. Though they were produced over an arc of time stretching from 5000 BCE to the present, only now have they achieved their true legibility. Agamben contends that we must understand that the images bequeathed by the past are really addressed to us, here and now; otherwise, our historical awareness is broken. Notwithstanding the attention to detail and the critical precautions that characterize the author's method--they provoke us with a force, even a violence, that we cannot escape. When we understand why Dostoevsky feared losing his faith before Holbein's Body of the Dead Christ, when Chardin's Still Life with Hare is suddenly revealed to our gaze as a crucifixion or Twombly's sculpture shows that beauty must ultimately fall, the artwork is torn from its museological context and restored to its almost prehistoric emergence. These artworks are beautifully reproduced in color throughout Agamben's short but significant addition to his scholarly oeuvre in English translation.

In a tour-de-force reinterpretation of the Christian tradition, Agamben shows that the Garden of Eden has always served as a symbol for humanity's true nature. What happened to paradise after Adam and Eve were expelled? The question may sound like a theological quibble, or even a joke, but in The Kingdom and the Garden, Giorgio Agamben uses it as a starting point for an investigation of human nature and the prospects for political transformation. In a tour-de-force reinterpretation of the Christian tradition, Agamben shows that the Garden of Eden has always served as a symbol of humanity's true nature. Where earlier theologians viewed the expulsion as temporary, Augustine's doctrine of original sin makes it permanent, reimagining humanity as the paradoxical creature that has been completely alienated from its own nature. From this perspective, there can be no return to paradise, only the hope for the messianic kingdom. Yet there have always been thinkers who rebelled against this idea, and Agamben highlights two major examples. The first is the early medieval philosopher John Scotus Eriugena, who argued for a radical unity of humanity with all living things. The second is Dante, whose vision of the earthly paradise points towards the possibility of genuine human happiness in this world. In place of the messianic kingdom, which has provided the model for modern revolutionary movements, Agamben contends that we should place our hopes for political change in a return to our origins, by reclaiming the earthly paradise.

A bold and adventurous work of literature that explores the relationship between reading, writing, sex, and death.  The first book in Pascal Quignard's Last Kingdom series, The Roving Shadows can be read as a long meditation on reading and writing that strives to situate these otherwise innocuous activities in a profound relationship to sex and death. Writing and reading can in fact be linked to our animal natures and artistic strivings, to primal forces and culturally persistent fascinations. With dexterity and inventiveness, Quignard weaves together historical anecdotes, folktales from the East and West, fragments of myth, and speculative historical reconstructions. The whole, written in a musical style not far removed from that of Couperin, whose piano composition Les Ombres errantes lends the book its title, coheres into a work of literature that reverberates in the psyche long after one has laid it down. The Roving Shadows is a rare and wondrous tour de force that cements Quignard's reputation in contemporary world literature. Available now in English, this boldly adventurous work will find a new and welcoming audience.

A fast-paced and action-packed dystopian novel, addressing the nature of power, the limits of rationality, and the dominance of fear. In a world on the brink of totalitarian rule, one man rises from the shadows to ignite a revolution and becomes the unlikely leader of a war of resistance that will shake the very foundations of power. General Firebrand, an unsocial and recovered alcoholic, considered a pariah by society, rises up against the country's fascist regime. In this guerrilla war, Firebrand garners support from the unlikeliest allies. Beasts and birds of the jungle join the struggle. Spirits of historical figures from past wars and fictional characters with supernatural abilities lend their strength to the cause. As a devastating secret is revealed that moves Firebrand to the core, the battle for liberation takes on new dimensions, exposing the fragility of rationality and the weight of historical wrongs committed in the name of a supposedly humane ideology.   With zany, irreverent prose and a breakneck pace, General Firebrand and His Red Atlas is an explosive debut novel that challenges conventional wisdom and explores the complexities of courage, doubt, and the pursuit of justice in a world dominated by fear.

An overview of nationalism and its impact on the study of history from one of India's most prominent historians.   In this timely book, historian Romila Thapar delves into the complex world of nationalism and its impact on the interpretations of the past and on the discipline of history itself. History, she expounds, is no mere collection of information and chronology, and its purpose extends well beyond storytelling.   Recognizing nationalism as a powerful force that gives rise to various narratives that provide ancestry to communities and shape the direction of societies, Thapar explores how, in India, two conflicting notions of nationalism have evolved and shaped the idea of the nation. Today, one such nationalistic theory claims the victimization of one religious community by another through centuries of "misrule." Such a claim willfully ignores ample evidence to the contrary to suit a particular political and ideological purpose. Thapar counters such attempts at misrepresentation by citing several historical instances of the nuanced interface and intermingling of cultures, as well as by showing how today's conflicts have their roots in the British colonial construction of India's history. She also addresses the recent controversy surrounding the deletions of sections of Indian history textbooks published by NCERT, the Indian educational council, and suggests that the intention is more likely to be the promotion of a particular reading of history that conforms to the ideology of those in power.   Engaging and thought-provoking, Our History, Their History, Whose History? invites readers to question the authenticity of historical narratives touted by one group of nationalists, and it explores the clash between professional historians who study the past to understand our inherited present and fabricators who wield history for political gain.

Lyrical and powerful poems that serve as a powerful reminder of the human cost of war. "Those who believe in the currency of patience / Were burned out in the alleyway."The Screams of War is a visceral collection of poems that confront the realities of contemporary Syria. Akram Alkatreb's verses capture the sense of the quotidian during war. His words, mere "murmurs engraved on stones," long for and despair over an irrevocable past. At the heart of Alkatreb's work lies a preoccupation with trauma and the profound burden of alienation that accompanies exile. Nascent memories are shrouded by the "scars of sleep," and words find themselves nostalgic for destruction. The ubiquity of violence that Alkatreb channels into his poetry does not tolerate enclaves of innocence. The Screams of War is an unforgettable testament to the resilience of the human spirit and a stark reminder of the harsh realities faced by those trapped in conflict.

"The Bonnet, the first work of prose by Slovak poet Kataírna Kucbeloáv, defies easy pigeonholing: both political and personal, it is a work of literary reportage, a quest for one's roots, a critical exploration of folk art and, not least, social commentary on the coexistence of the Slovak majority and the Roma minority, offering a nuanced and sympathetic look at the lives of Roma people in Slovakia, and raising important questions about the nature of prejudice and discrimination. Over two years, the author made regular visits to the remote village of `umiac in Slovakia to learn the dying craft of bonnet making from one of its last practitioners, Il'ka, an elderly local woman who in the process became her mentor in more ways than one. Through the parallel stories of Il'ka and the narrator's grandmother, The Bonnet also offers a subtly feminist reading of the position of women in rural Europe from the early twentieth century to the present day."

A rare narrative of gay love in the Arab world that travels into the lives of a group of spirited youth during the Syrian Revolution. Youssef's mother has always told him that he is named after the biblical prophet Joseph who had the power of foresight. But when Youssef participated in the first demonstration in Damascus in 2011, he felt that the uprising against the Bashar al-Assad regime after forty years of silence and fear was "a miracle more powerful than that of the prophet." While Josephine, a charming young Alawite, gathers in her home a group of youth to fight for their visions of a promising future, a forbidden love story unfolds between two men, Youssef and Mohammad. Meanwhile, young Khalid's love for Josephine is brutally interrupted by the agents of the oppressive regime. Homosexuality clashes with tradition, emancipation with persecution, and feelings with loyalties, leading to an upheaval that sweeps away the destinies of the young as well as that of an entire nation. Omar Youssef Souleimane's eloquent novel is not only a narrative of the Syrian Revolution; it is also a story about inter-generational conflicts, rebellion, and liberation. With intense, poetic prose, he brilliantly captures the indomitable yearning for freedom that, despite all obstacles and setbacks, always survives in a hopeful person's heart until it's attained.

Challenging conventional notions of racial and regional identity, Léonora Miano provides a fresh perspective on the complexities of self-perception.   In this ground-breaking exploration, French-Cameroonian author Léonora Miano unveils a distinct sensibility shaped by her sub-Saharan African roots, setting her apart from those who identify as Afro-Europeans, or Afropeans, a group forged within the European context. Drawing on her unique perspective, Miano reveals the complexities that determine self-perception and complicate the bonds of identification and solidarity between Afro-Europeans and their sub-Saharan counterparts. Contrasting with France's approach of lumping all citizens of sub-Saharan descent together under an "African" label, the author questions the effectiveness of such categorization in fostering a genuine connection to one's country and assuming responsibility for its future.   Despite the many challenges, Miano finds hope in the Afropean identity-those who embrace the fusion of Africa and Europe within their self-designation-believing it holds the potential to embody a transformative, fraternal, anti-imperialist, and anti-racist societal project. Yet, she acknowledges the persistent struggle for acceptance and understanding in a society grappling with identity tensions. In this powerful narrative, Miano examines the allure of rejection that exists on both sides of the divide, offering a nuanced examination of the delicate balance between cultures, identities, and the pursuit of a utopian vision. Timely and captivating, this book is essential to understanding the Afropean perspective.

Three short story collections that sink into the lives of characters seeking meaning in a post-war world, available in a boxed set.   Sharp as a razor and as subtle as gossamer, Shmuel T. Meyer's masterfully crafted stories evoke unique individual sensibilities and destinies, resonating with the sensual details, smells, tastes, music, and sounds of a specific time and place. And the War Is Over brings together three collections of short stories set on three continents in the aftermath of war: World War II and the Shoah in Grand European Express, the Korean War in The Great American Disaster, and the Arab-Israeli conflict in Kibbutz.   Characters both real and imagined run through a fabric so tightly woven that the threads of history and fiction can barely be separated: the Roman poet Clara who will never write again; Saul, a New York City police detective haunted by memories of the Pusan Perimeter; a brother out to avenge his sister's murder; the son of a former Nazi who joins the Red Army Faction. Tracing moments of encounter, their paths cross those of Allen Ginsberg, Albert Cossery, John Coltrane, and Duke Ellington. Characters travel by train from Venice to Paris, hike up the Val d'Annivers, listen to jazz in Greenwich Village, and ride a motorcycle along the sandy road to Haifa. Under the shadow of war, with death lurking, these multifaceted, evocative lives move in a space between coincidence and fate.

Poetry that serves as an evocative portrayal of diverse landscapes and cultures.   In these otherworldly poetry sequences, Samira Negrouche reminds us that "all life is movement," where "time passes through me / beings pass through me / they are me / I am them." The "I" is representative of one voice, three voices, all voices, all rooted in movement as their bodies brush past one another, brush against thresholds of time and space. Everything is in flux-including the dream-like landscapes at the borders of borders-as the poet seeks to recover parts of self and memory, on both a personal and universal level. In these poems, history-laden locales such as Algiers, Timbuktu, N'Djamena, Cotonou, Zanzibar, Cape Town, and Gorée are evoked. Even the language, expertly and sensitively translated by Nancy Naomi Carlson, refuses to be pinned down, as it loops back on itself. At times contradictory, at times fractured in meaning, syntax, and diction, the playful language is riddled with "restless" verbs. In the end, the "I" takes on prophetic overtones, instilling hope for the future.