Draft:Walid Khazendar

Walid Khazendar (Arabic: وليد خازندار, romanized: Walīd Khāzindār) is a Palestinian poet born in 1950.

He began writing poetry as a teenager in Gaza. He published his first book of poetry in Beirut in 1986, which includes some of the early poems he wrote in Gaza.

Biography
Walid Khazendar was born in 1950, in Gaza, Palestine.

From 1958-1974 he completed his pre-university studies in Gaza. At the age of 24 he left Gaza for Beirut, Lebanon, where he attended the Beirut Arab University to study law, obtaining his degree in 1978.

After graduation, he remained in Beirut where, from 1978-1982, he worked as a researcher at the Palestine Research Centre.

From 1998-1999 he was Arab Writer in Residence at Oxford. He arrived in Oxford in September, 1998, as the first Arab Writer in Residence by invitation from the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies University of Oxford ( formerly known as Oriental Institute). Beyond his work with the students, he participated in two poetry events which were held in the Old Library, All Souls College, Oxford. The first event was a round table discussion on ‘Poetry and Science’; the second event was a Poetry Reading by new Oxford Poets chosen and introduced by Khazendar.

From 2002-2005 he worked as a Research Fellow at the St John’s College Research Centre, University of Oxford, where he participated in a project on Arabic Poetry and Poetics and translated and edited various works. During this period he established a Database of Arabic Literature in English Research.

In 2011 he obtained his PhD at SOAS University of London, with a study on the Poetic Image.

From 2011-2012 he was Lecturer in Palestinian Literature at SOAS University of London.

Poetic style
Khazendar does not comply  with Arabic poetry meters, mixing instead between passion and semantic intent, between the tension of the poetic phrase and its cohesion.

While continuing to write the Prose poetry (qasidat al-nathr), Khazendar accentuates the internal rhythm of his poems. The lines of composition are not considered unconscious digressions from the main prose structure of the poem but organic component parts of the rhythmic scheme of the poem.

Over the eight collections of poetry he has published so far, Khazendar has continued to develop his poetic style with advances in form and rhythmic choices. He deals with occupation and preoccupation through an intensely personal, self-reflective style.

Language structure remains the most vital feature in Khazendar’s poetic style. Nearly every word in his poetry has a special presence, chosen carefully in order to enter the particular texture of a poem.

There is a persistent pursuit of an aesthetic association between language and poetic syntax. This syntax draws upon anastrophe in order to reconstruct the pattern of language in his poem, and does not rely on the use of ready language and its ornamental figures.

His preoccupation with language and with making speech translucent, manifests itself in his use of ellipsis and concision.

Awards
The Palestine Prize for Poetry, 1997, for his third collection Evening Rapture.

Poetry Collections in Arabic
Present Acts (Af‘al Mudari‘a). Beirut: Dar Ibn Rushd lil-Taba’a wa al-Nashr, 1986

Aimless Rooms (Ghuraf Ta’isha). Beirut: Dar al-Fikr, 1992.

Evening Rapture (Satwat al-Masa’). Beirut: Bisan, 1996.

The Directions of this Town (Jihat hadhhi al-Madina. Oxford: Bayan Books, 2015.

Houses of Possible Light (Buyut al-Nur al-Mumkin). Oxford: Bayan Books, 2017.

Days of Sea and Desert (Ayyam al-Bahr wa-al-Sahra’). Oxford: Bayan Books, 2018.

Night Fragments (Maqati’ Layl). Oxford: Bayan Books, 2020.

Sails the Colour of Twilight (Ashri’a bi-lawn al-fajr). Oxford: Bayan Books, 2022.

Poems After Khazendar in English
‘Belongings’ in The Road to Inver: Translations, Versions, Imitations 1975-2003, by Tom Paulin. London: Faber & Faber, 2004.

Four Poems by Tom Paulin, after Walid Khazendar. London Review of Books, volume 28, number 10, 25 May, 2006, page 22.

‘Poems after Walid Khazendar’ in Love’s Bonfire by Tom Paulin. London: Faber & Faber, 2012.

New Selected Poems by Tom Paulin. London: Faber & Faber, 2014.

Poems in Translation
Fifteen poems in AGENDA, translated by Dinah Manisty, Spring (Vol. 35, No. 1) London,1997.

Nine poems in Modern Poetry in Translation, translated by Dinah Manisty. (New Series/No. 13) London,1998.

Ten poems. Translated by Khaled Mattawa from Ghuraf Taisha, Dar al-Fikr, Beirut

1992 and Satwat al-Masa’, Dar Bissan, Beirut, 1996. London: Banipal No 6, Autumn,1999.

Two poems, ‘Instantly all ends’ and ‘Some other ember’, translated by Marie-Therese Abdel-Messih from al-Qassida magazine, No. 1, Nicosia, 2000. In London: Banipal, No 15/16, Autumn/Spring, 2002-2003.

‘Distant Light’, translation/ interpretation by Michael R. Burch, May 20.

Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature, ed. Salma Jayyusi. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992.

La Poésie Palestinienne Contemporaine: choix de textes et traduction de l’arabe par Abdellaftif Laâbi, Paris: Messidor, 1990, pages 169-171.

Poèmes et Nouvelles de Palestine in Revue d’études Palestiniennes, 24 nouvelle série, été 2000, pages 4-6.

Zwischen Zauber und Zeichen: Moderne arabische Lyrik von 1945 bis heute. Khalid al-Maaly (Hrsg). Berlin: Das Arabische Buch, 2000, pages 311-313.

Die Farbe der Ferne: Moderne arabische Dichtung. Herausgegeben und übersetzt von Stefan Weidner. München: C.H. Beck, 2000, pages 197-202.

In un mondo senza Cielo: antologia della poesia Palestinese. Edited by Francesca Maria Corrao; translated by Fulvia De Luca, Simone Sibilio. Florence: Giunti Editore, 2007.

Khazendar's poems in music
Heinali, Improvisations referencing Walid Khazendar's poetry, entitled ‘A Night is a Flash’, the name of a poem from Khazendar’s third collection.