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A history of World War One poetry
\"Situating First World War poetry in a truly global context, this book reaches beyond the British soldier-poet canon. A History of World War One Poetry examines popular and literary, ephemeral and enduring poems that the cataclysm of 1914-1918 inspired. Across Europe, poets wrestled with the same problem: how to represent a global conflict, dominated by modern technology, involving millions of combatants and countless civilians. For literary scholars this has meant discovering and engaging with the work of men and women writing in other languages, on other fronts, and from different national perspectives. Poems are presented in their original languages and in English translations, some for the very first time, while a Coda reflects on the study and significance of First World War poetry in the wake of the Centenary. A History of World War One Poetry offers a new perspective on the literary and human experience of 1914-1918\"-- Provided by publisher.
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The tortoise and the soldier : based on true events
\"As a boy, Henry Friston dreamed of traveling the world. He thought he was signing up for a lifetime of adventure when he joined the Royal Navy. But when World War I begins, it launches the world, and Henry, into turmoil. While facing enemy fire at Gallipoli, Henry discovers the strength he needs to survive in an unexpected source: a tortoise. And so begins the friendship of a lifetime\"-- Provided by publisher.
BOOK
Symbol and Painting in Thurayya Al-Baqsami's Creative Output
As Manfred Lurker writes:When we speak today about literary symbolism we constantly come up against Goethe, who totally accepted the world of phenomena yet saw in it a reflection of a higher reality. Real symbolism is perceived when that which especially represents the entirety does so not as dream and shade but as life and the momentary manifestation of that which is not banal.In a further part of the interview he writes that the qualifications of a symbol can be: the carrier of meaning, pictorial concept, comparison, personification, paradigm, model, type, but also archetype, metaphor and allegory…Thurayya Al-Baqsami's prose simply abounds in symbols which appear in the most varied of functions: obstruction, unveiling, drawing attention, the construction of the desired psychological mood, the achievement of an expression of truth or the pure disinterested functioning as a sign.In the short story As-sursur (The Cockroach) from the collection As-sidra (The Lotus tree) the title insect is the construction axis for the whole short story. As a symbol it functions in two roles: the first of a direct impression which is disturbing, arousing repugnance, disgust and revolt as well as functioning in the role of ‘conveyor of negativity’. In this role it casts a shadow on the whole of life, almost damaging the wedding causing a panic-struck desire to leave the house. In a word it is a real plague.
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Life Story
It happens sometimes to writers that they draw or paint on the margins of their work, the opposite is also known, the literary attempts of the painter. It is rare, however, when both of these fields are treated professionally by the self same person. It is just such dualism that we find in Thurayya Al-Baqsami. Enough to state that the very same hand that wrote Cellar Candles – for which she was awarded a prize by the Kuwaiti Foundation for Scientific Development – illustrated the said volume. The illustrations are in her intention a supplement to the text, creativity equal and accompanying the written word. At times one may be under the impression that Thurayya competes between drawing and the word.The pictorial nature of the prose and the factual graphicness that accompanies the drawings results in the fact that these two elements change as if their functions: the text becomes an illumination of the illustration, while it too becomes the premonition of the image painted with a word.Thurayya Al-Baqsami has overcome with her work many barriers not only those connected with being a woman-artist, but also those linked to the tradition of visual art within the Arab world. There are numerous throwbacks to elements from the past; she reaches for ancient cultures, as well as making use of the living cultural customs of the present. On the example of the phenomenon of her creative personality one may conjecture as to the role her creativity fulfils in relation to the actual Arab world outlook, and a wider consciousness on the scale of civilisation per se.
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The Collection of Short Stories Shumu' as-saradib (Cellar Candles)
Thurayya Al-Baqsami's collection of short stories Shumu' as-saradib (Cellar Candles) is in its entirety devoted to the Iraqi armed military intervention in Kuwait and an analysis of the literary situation of Kuwaitis during the occupation. The very motto, the poetical dedication to the collection, introducing the collection, reveals the chief idea of the work:Scythes of war harvested innocent souls,Pure blood perfumed the fields of the Nation,To make grow tombstones of acts of heroism,Towering like golden stalks of wheat,I dedicate memories like embersTo the stalks of Kuwaiti heroism.The metaphor of tombstones of acts of heroism, towering like golden stalks of wheat in a resounding way portrays the war tragedy that the author witnessed and participated in. Thurayya's sensitive heart, that of a writer and poet, has meant that even in the most difficult of situations she is able with her heart to bring into existence something what allows her to maintain hope. The wheat sheaves are in fact the harvest of death, yet they symbolise real heroism, discord for the disturbing of dignity, in fact the life of an independent soul.In the short story Zaman al-inhidar (Time of Decline) there is a study of a woman's feelings who as a result of the occupation of the city by the invaders loses her sense of reality – of a reality which is unable to fulfil basic human requirements:After time had declined, body and name, she lay in her warm bed, ate, slept, got up and observed her beautiful head through an opening in the workshop door.
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Fi kaffi ‘usfura zarqa’ (The Blue Sparrow on My Palm) – Thurayya Al-Baqsami's Poetical World
It is no easy task to write about the poetry of Thurayya Al-Baqsami, it constituting no mean challenge. Thurayya has been writing poetry almost since childhood. During her period of study in Moscow she even wrote poetry in Russian, and upon returning to Kuwait she had her own poetry column entitled Nuqush (Sketches) within the pages of the ‘Al-Watan’ newspaper. Since 1994 she has published her texts in the journal ‘Al-Qabas’ in a column entitled Nusus wa risha (Texts and Brush). She herself illustrates her poetry with drawings. The verse that is found in the daily press is hugely popular because of its specific and symbolic vision of feelings and human desires as well as for the criticism of Kuwaiti and Arab society that it contains.Thurayya Al-Baqsami, so it appears, has yet to develop a definite attitude towards the phenomenon of her own poetical creativity. These works can be neither considered poetry nor prose. The matter is left open for the reader. It seems that they are works written in poetical prose in which one may perceive the beauty of poetic language, while the author herself feels herself a poet. Thurayya writes as such in the forewords to her first volume of poetry published in Kuwait in 1999 and entitled Fikaffi ‘usfura zarqa’ (The Blue Sparrow on My Palm):These are the travel memoirs of a woman upon whose palm sang a blue sparrow.
Book Chapter
Muzakkirat Fattuma al-kuwaytiyya as-saghira (Recollections of a Small Kuwaiti Fattuma)
Muzakkirat Fattuma al-kuwaytiyya as-saghira (Recollections of a Small Kuwaiti Fattuma) published in 1992 deals with the period of armed aggression against Kuwait – from the first day, i.e. 2nd of August 1992 to the last day, which was the 26th of February 1991 – as seen through the eyes of a child. Fattuma, Thurayya's then nine-year-old daughter notes down her recollections with her mother's help and illustrates them with own illustrations.This text increases in world literature the genre of children's confessions collected in the form of prose, the foremost example of which in Europe is Anne Frank's Diary. The war experiences of children are always the greatest violation of their rights and undeserved wrong, the traces of which are usually felt through their whole life. They will not be children, but they are already people – wrote Janusz Korczak, the great friend of children and defender of their rights: They deserve a third of the produce and riches of the earth – out of right and not charity. The fruits of a third of the victories of human thought are theirs – he wrote demanding equal rights for children in relation to adults and their protection in the face of cruel reality. Relating to the last cited thought Fattuma's diary seems to be such a victory of thought. Returning once more to Korczak's thinking from the reading of Muzakkirat Fattuma al-kuwaytiyya as-saghira (Recollections of a Small Kuwaiti Fattuma) strikes the certainty of the truth in his superb identification of the human relation of generations, which he had already concluded in the ghetto in addressing children in the orphanage: And this is the truth that everyone ought to understand and remember well: we are bringing you up, but you are also bringing us up.
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The Collection of Short Stories Al-'araq al-aswad (The Black Sweat)
The Stories from the collection Al-'araq al-aswad (The Black Sweat), as a result of the varied theme matter create at the same time their own composition as well as a compendium of knowledge about Kuwait and Kuwaitis, an image of social life from the period preceding the oil boom. As the author herself writes and recalls she wanted in the collection to present the customs, way of life, work and belief in superstitions. Hence each short story deals with a different matter or subject. Thanks to which these short stories build up in fragments, almost in a documentary way, a reconstruction of the past which has gone yet remains present, below the surface, within the mentality of contemporary Kuwaiti society. So what is the image presented to us? It is the already generally well-known profile of a society varied materially and ethnically, where the fate of children and their future is basically foreseen from the moment they are born. If someone was born into a shopkeeper's family then the most fantastic thing that fate could deliver him is either the inheritance of the family fortune, or an attempt to organise his own, although a modest stall with sweets, cakes, musk etc. Attempts to transcend one's social position are on the whole condemned to failure. We can see this in the short story Ad-dumya (The Doll), where we are witnesses to the maturing of childish consciousness, which in the enthusiasm for play and friendship slowly starts to discern the cruel details concerning the disproportion of the position of its friend 'Abd Allah.
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