Self-Portrait as Ruth
Jasmine Donahaye(Author)
Salt Publishing
Published on 1. November 2009
Book
Hardback
64 pages
978-1-84471-459-9 (ISBN)
Description
Self-Portrait as Ruth is a provocative collection exploring the subject of Israel-Palestine in sharp, accessible poems that eschew the conventional language or orientation of either Zionist or Palestinian solidarity. Rooted in a Jewish family history that reaches into nineteenth-century Ottoman Palestine, Self-Portrait as Ruth is written in defiance of all `official' versions of Israeli or Palestinian history.
Polemical in places, the densely, painfully political subject matter is humanised throughout by a weaving together of individual and community, family and tribe, lover and self, nation and landscape. These poems are interrogations of the first person possessive - of claims, both singular and plural, to land, to identity, to history, and to the body - and of wounds and victimisation, both unique and collective.
A challenging, aching, honest exploration of culpability, this lament will incite controversy and debate, making uncomfortable reading for partisans and non-partisans alike.
Polemical in places, the densely, painfully political subject matter is humanised throughout by a weaving together of individual and community, family and tribe, lover and self, nation and landscape. These poems are interrogations of the first person possessive - of claims, both singular and plural, to land, to identity, to history, and to the body - and of wounds and victimisation, both unique and collective.
A challenging, aching, honest exploration of culpability, this lament will incite controversy and debate, making uncomfortable reading for partisans and non-partisans alike.
Reviews / Votes
This book, wrestling with the conflicting perspectives of nationality, displacement and religion, is steeped in Israeli and Palestinian history. Land is portrayed throughout as an untrustworthy burden, full of temporary demarcations, constantly under threat of change. Take the short poem "The Border, 1947": "she stands a moment, one foot still in Palestine, / the other in Lebanon." The book's biographical note tells us that Donahaye's family have roots in 19th-century Palestine, and the writing tries to open longer perspectives. The elegy for the poet's family in "Gaza, summer 2006" attempts to negotiate a sense of place that becomes ever more inclusive ("the crowd chanting shema Yisrael will forget / what it was they were called to mourn, and the muezzin will sing / Allahu") and there are tentative moments of respite celebrated here in pieces such as "Water" or "The bus to Ramallah". But violence and damage are continually asserting themselves, and the collection ends with the forebodings and threats of "An angel is passing": "You hear the jeeps; you feel / the rumble of the tanks' approach." -- Charles Bainbridge * The Guardian * This book, wrestling with the conflicting perspectives of nationality, displacement and religion, is steeped in Israeli and Palestinian history. Land is portrayed throughout as an untrustworthy burden, full of temporary demarcations, constantly under threat of change. -- Charles Bainbridge * The Guardian *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Illustrations
Not illustrated
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 140 mm
Thickness: 4 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-84471-459-9 (9781844714599)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Jasmine Donahaye has published poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction and scholarship. Her first collection, Misappropriations, was shortlisted for the Jerwood Aldeburgh first collection prize in 2006, and her monograph Whose People? Wales, Israel, Palestine published by the University of Wales Press.
Content
Self-portrait as Ruth
Thirst
Palestina
Fetishes
Sheba before Solomon
Israel v. Palestine: a sonnet
The seamline
Harry Potter goes on sale in the Beit She'an valley
Water
Gaza, summer 2006
The bus to Ramallah
Cynhaeaf
Fragments
Stillbirth
My father's circumcision
Pheasants
The civic centre, Tel Aviv
Lachshon hora
A stoning
Jerusalem performing
The Palestine or orange-tufted sunbird
Belongings
Gaza closed
Migrants
An inquisition
Remembering Baba Yaga
The Jewish Golden Age
The border, 1947
Storytelling
To a man approaching middle age
A kind of tikkun
Elijah's return
An angel is passing
Thirst
Palestina
Fetishes
Sheba before Solomon
Israel v. Palestine: a sonnet
The seamline
Harry Potter goes on sale in the Beit She'an valley
Water
Gaza, summer 2006
The bus to Ramallah
Cynhaeaf
Fragments
Stillbirth
My father's circumcision
Pheasants
The civic centre, Tel Aviv
Lachshon hora
A stoning
Jerusalem performing
The Palestine or orange-tufted sunbird
Belongings
Gaza closed
Migrants
An inquisition
Remembering Baba Yaga
The Jewish Golden Age
The border, 1947
Storytelling
To a man approaching middle age
A kind of tikkun
Elijah's return
An angel is passing