Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Sa`di Yusuf was displeased that Mahmud Darwish, and not he, won the poetry prize in Cairo this week. Let me tell you, Sa`di Yusuf: I am not a big fan of your poetry, but you are a good person from what I hear. And you have been politically courageous. But what Mahmud Darwish writes: is even beyond poetry. Taha Husayn once said that in Arabic: there is prose, poetry, and Qur'an. I add: and there is the poetry of Mahmud Darwish. So Sa`di Yusuf: calm down.