Quote

I don't decide to represent anything except myself. But that self is full of collective memory.

Mahmoud Darwish

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Mahmoud Darwish
Age: 67 †
Born: 1941
Born: January 1
Died: 2008
Died: January 1
Author
Poet
Writer
Al-Birweh
M. Darwish
Mahmoud Darwish
Memories
Full
Anything
Collectives
Self
Collective
Represent
Decide
Memory
Except

More quotes by Mahmoud Darwish

Image
Without hope we are lost.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Every beautiful poem is an act of resistance.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
I never wanted children, maybe I'm afraid of responsibility.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
The metaphor for Palestine is stronger than the Palestine of reality.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Sometimes I feel as if I am read before I write. When I write a poem about my mother, Palestinians think my mother is a symbol for Palestine. But I write as a poet, and my mother is my mother. She's not a symbol.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
One day, I will be a poet. Water will depend on my visions.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Against barbarity, poetry can resist only by confirming its attachment to human fragility like a blade of grass growing on a wall while armies march by.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
For the Arabs in Israel there is always a tension between nationality and identity.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Life defined only as the opposite of death is not life.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
... For me it is essential, essential for the poet to have a new toast, new songs.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
To be under occupation, to be under siege, is not a good inspiration for poetry.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Where can I free myself of the homeland in my body?
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
My love, I fear the silence of your hands.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
Exile is more than a geographical concept. You can be an exile in your homeland, in your own house, in a room.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
The days have taught you not to trust happiness because it hurts when it deceives.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
I believe in the power of poetry, which gives me reasons to look ahead and identify a glint of light.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
I want to find a language that transforms language itself into steel for the spirit--a language to use against these sparkling insects, these jets.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
I learnt all the words worthy of the court of blood So that I could break the rule I learnt all the words and broke them up To make a single word: Homeland.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
And what I don't understand I grasp it only when it's too late.
Mahmoud Darwish
Image
I wish I were a candle in the darkness.
Mahmoud Darwish