Dunya Mikhail, celebrated Iraqi poet, will read and discuss her poetry. With irony and subversive simplicity, Mikhail addresses themes of war, exile, and loss, using forms such as reportage, fable, and lyric. Before immigrating to the States in the mid- 1990s, she worked as a Literary Editor, translator and journalist for the Baghdad Observer until being placed on Saddam Hussein’s enemies list. Mikhail speaks and writes in Arabic, Assyrian and English. Her work includes several collections of poetry: The Iraqi Nights, Diary of A Wave Outside the Sea, and The War Works Hard, and has appeared in numerous poetry journals and anthologies.
Her honors include the Kresge Fellowship, Arab American Book Award, and the United Nations Human Rights Award for Freedom of Writing. The War Works Hard was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize and named one of the New York Public Library’s “Twenty-Five Books to Remember from 2005.” She is the co-founder of Mesopotamian Forum for Art and Culture in Michigan and she has taught at Michigan State University.
Tuesday, May 5 | 5:00pm to 6:15pm
Sawyer Library, Sawyer 307, Mabie Room
Organized by Willams College Arabic Studies with generous sponsorship from the Lecture Committee and the Oakley Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences, the Center for Foreign Languages, Literatures, and Cultures and the Program in Comparative Literature.
Megamenu Social