Malu Halasa is the editor, with Jordan Elgrably, of the new anthology Sumud. Her other anthologies include Woman Life Freedom. She is the literary editor of The Markaz Review.
Q: How did you choose the authors to include in your new anthology?
A: As I watched the war on Gaza and the discussion around the war particularly in the US, I felt helpless. We had been covering Palestine across many fronts at The Markaz Review (TMR) and not just politically but very much culturally, in literature, art, and through influential thinkers like Edward Said. So my first port of call for the book was to look at the material TMR had published since 2019.
I also thought that it was important at this time to produce a “Palestinian Reader” so that people who were coming to Palestine perhaps for the first time, that new generation that was on the streets of US in the UK protesting against the war, could encounter a wealth of material that would give myriad points of view, in a variety of expressions.
Poetry is the one form of writing that has really exploded, not just because of the war but because of a new generation of voices that have matured. Palestinian poetry is pointed and poignant, from Mosab Abu Toha and Hala Alyan to Mohammadi El-Kurd, Noor Hindi and Zeina Azzam.
Also I was keen to include fiction and the sci-fi story in the anthology. “Application 39” by Ahmed Masoud came from a collection of Palestinian short stories, Palestine +100: Stories from a Century after the Nakba, that was published by Comma Press.
We had chosen that story because of its dystopian implications. Two hackers make a joke to get Gaza City to host the Olympics but they also have worried about drones that are following them around and threatening to kill them. The story seemed to be a reflection of exactly what was going on in Gaza, where drones were targeting international aid workers and killing them.
Also important to the anthology was the inclusion of literary criticism and art criticism. In a review some of these creative works are put into sharp perspective and the reader is provided with a wider context.
So the selection of writers for the anthology was influenced by this constant bombardment of news and absolutely horrific images that became sadly almost normalized during the war. When we were putting the anthology together I thought at times life and subjects and issues in the writing were mirror images of each other.
Q: How did you decide on the order in which the pieces would appear?
A: Sumud is the eighth anthology that I’ve coedited/edited and in anthologies I’ve become very aware of the way in which you take the hand of your reader and lead them through what at first might seem a forest of material.
However, there are important vistas along the way, way stations, and points of contemplation so that they are better able to see and comprehend the experiences being presented.
A “reader” for me is the equivalent of sitting in a movie theater in the midst of surround sound. But there is delicacy, melody, rhythmic moments that need to come through and they all can’t do it exactly at the same time.
So when one puts together an anthology it’s important to have drama and chronology and in terms of Palestine a kind of knowing compassion because it is a complex history and it is not only about the war going on since 2023 but about occupation, resilience, resistance and hope that the Palestinians have had and continue to have, despite the odds against them these many long years.
Q: For those who are not familiar with it, can you explain more about The Markaz Review and its history?
A: My coeditor for the book, Jordan Elgrably, ran the Levantine Center in LA which closed during Covid. In 2019 he started TMR as a collective in many ways with writers, artists, filmmakers, and poets as an online critical review which showcases literature, art, and culture from the Middle East and beyond, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and North Africa.
Currently TMR produces monthly themed editions and weekly Friday editions. The online magazine also wanted to bring more Arab, Persian, and Dari and Pashto voices into English translation.
Q: In our previous Q&A, we discussed your anthology Woman Life Freedom--what do you see as the women’s contribution to this anthology?
A: The women’s voices in Sumud are critical and hard-hitting. TMR senior editor Lina Mounzer in her essay “Palestine in the Unspeakable” wrote early on in the war about how some words like genocide, cease-fire, apartheid were not words/ideas that were “allowed” in the context of October 7 and yet now they have become foundational through which the Israeli occupation is now seen and understood.
Azzam’s poem “Write My Name Mam” about children whose parents have written their names on their legs just in case families are killed during the bombings of Gaza and their children are killed, orphaned, or wounded.
Literary critic Eman Quotah writes about redaction in literature. West Bank curator Nadine Aranki considers the resurgence of the Palestinian political poster during war.
The young Palestinian man is much-maligned in Israeli propaganda but behind these young men or alongside of them are mothers, sisters, and even daughters. So women are key to the Palestinian struggle and they have emerged as enlightened, important voices and thinkers in the country’s literature and art.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: At TMR we’re getting ready for February’s issue which is themed on memoir. My computer’s spectacular crash comes at an inopportune time because I’m traveling and I should be in the throes of editing.
We have some very interesting writing for the issue: one is a moving short story by Dia Barghouti; another essay on aviation and modernity considers Gaza and Singapore by Chin-chin Yap.
There’s an explosion of cultural initiatives going on in the new Syria that the filmmaker Yasmin Fedda and Dan Gorman from English PEN will cover.
Syria surprised all of us. Let’s hope that this cease-fire will do the same and lead to a just settlement and homeland for the Palestinian people.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Malu Halasa.
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