Behar and Abou Shmeiss Deploy Multilingual Verse to Confront Conflict

Behar与Abou Shmeiss借多语种诗歌直面冲突 诗歌揭示了撕裂以色列人与巴勒斯坦人的深层语言断裂与政治现实，作家们在此期间努力应对持续的战争暴力。 活动开场悼念了犹太人大屠杀幸存者Irene Butter与跨宗教领袖Samantha Woll，随后将三语诗歌朗诵与围绕语言、身份及战争的深入对话结合在一起。Ayat Abou Shmeiss解释了在雅法的成长经历如何促使她将希伯来语作为生存与政治表达的工具，同时悼念在加沙遇害的家人，并致力于通过自己的出版社推广加沙诗人的作品。Almog Behar回顾了国家主导对其家族巴格达阿拉伯语和拉迪诺语根基的抹杀，反思了自己重新找回阿拉伯语的历程，以及对单纯依靠共享语言能否弥合深重政治分歧这一问题逐渐转向更为冷静审慎的看法。在后半段，两位诗人朗诵了近期创作的直击人心的作品，直面加沙战争带来的创伤与毁灭，随后回答了现场观众关于翻译机制、受众反响以及毫不掩饰的艺术真实性之必要性的提问。 拉乌尔·瓦伦堡研究所（Raoul Wallenberg Institute）在10月7日前夕邀请诗人Almog Behar与Ayat Abou Shmeiss，探讨以色列人与巴勒斯坦人能否通过诗歌弥合分歧并表达创伤。 (0:09) Ayat Abou Shmeiss谈及了作为来自雅法的巴勒斯坦人使用希伯来语写作的复杂性，并分享了直面加沙的毁灭、家庭悲痛以及以色列社会日常生活中心理疏离感的作品。 (25:11) Almog Behar强调了以色列米兹拉希犹太人所经历的制度性阿拉伯语抹杀，指出第二代和第三代后裔往往必须通过巴勒斯坦阿拉伯语和文学来重新联结其祖辈遗产。 (40:56) 两位作家均认为，10月7日之后的真正文学对话不能依赖表面上的客套，而是要求创作者直接面对赤裸的真相、国家暴力以及根深蒂固的恐惧。 (90:38)

In a dialogue hosted by the University of Michigan's Raoul Wallenberg Institute, poets Almog Behar and Ayat Abou Shmeiss examined whether poetry can bridge Israeli and Palestinian experiences, arguing that genuine literary encounter requires confronting political complicity, historical dispossession, and unvarnished grief rather than seeking easy reconciliation. Linguistic Duality and Heritage Reclamation (25:11) Both writers operate across Hebrew and Arabic, navigating identities reshaped by state policies and displacement. For Abou Shmeiss, a Palestinian from Jaffa, Hebrew was the everyday language of neighborhood clinics and post offices rather than a purely militarized idiom. Although her mother enrolled her in a private French school using the Jewish Hebrew curriculum out of basic survival—ensuring her children could comprehend state bureaucracy after being denied literacy during the Nakba—critics later questioned whether writing in Hebrew equated to aligning with the state. Abou Shmeiss framed Hebrew as an existing tool to challenge Israeli audiences directly while embedding Palestinian identity through cultural markers and the grammatical gender contrasts between Arabic and Hebrew. In contrast, Behar recounted how his Baghdadi Jewish family was pressured into shedding Iraqi Arabic in the 1950s under Israeli assimilation directives that privileged modern Hebrew and European languages like Danish. This severance became stark when his grandmother developed dementia and reverted exclusively to Arabic, exposing a manufactured generational silence. Behar argued that second- and third-generation Mizrahi Jews seeking their ancestral tongue could only do so through Palestinian Arabic and Palestinian literature, leading him to treat Arabic not as foreign, but as an intimate, reclaimed part of his heritage. Poetic Witness and the Immediate Ruin of War (54:13) The ongoing war and the destruction in Gaza cast an unavoidable shadow over the poets' creative work. Abou Shmeiss read poems capturing the dissociation of commuting to work through regular Israeli traffic while knowing family members—ranging from toddlers aged three to adults in their twenties—had been killed in Khan Yunis and Shuja'iyya. Her poetry interrogates daily complicity, watching ordinary citizens and returning soldiers while grappling with the agonizing suspicion of who participated in the airstrikes that flattened residential buildings. In another poem, she imagined maternal resistance across national lines, stating that if she were a Jewish mother, she would physically bind her son's limbs and senses to prevent him from serving in the military. Behar addressed catastrophe by reframing Jewish liturgical mourning. In "Tisha B'Av 2025," he transformed the traditional fast day commemorating the ancient destruction of the Jerusalem Temples into a lament for contemporary bloodshed, declaring that the ruin of Jerusalem is inextricably entangled with the ongoing destruction of Gaza. In another piece dedicated to Gazan writer Manal Miqdad, "A Woman Awaits the Bombardment," Behar cataloged the domestic terror of an individual preparing for an airstrike by deciding how to bequeath her personal library, stripping away heroic rhetoric to expose nocturnal panic. Translation, Cross-Border Reception, and Linguistic Friction (76:45) Translation operates for both authors as both a site of tension and an avenue for new meaning. Abou Shmeiss described having a translator enter her work as admitting a third person into an intimate sanctuary, acknowledging that while nuances shift, publication relinquishes an author's exclusive ownership. Her work encountered skepticism among some broader Palestinian readers who initially suspected assimilation, though she noted this suspicion abated once readers engaged with her authentic verses. Behar, referencing Salman Rushdie's notion of what is gained in translation, compared the process to a musical re-scoring. He described working with an Egyptian translator to publish his novel in Cairo, where they preserved Judeo-Arabic dialects with side notations and adapted rabbinical Hebrew phrasing using the register of classical Sufi texts. While his parents initially questioned his return to Arabic after decades spent assimilating, seeing his prose recognized in Cairo legitimized his literary pursuit. The Fragility of Literary Solidarity (40:56) Both poets expressed sober realism regarding poetry's capacity to alter geopolitical realities. Behar reflected on the shift in his outlook over two decades: while he once believed that mutual linguistic exposure would bridge communal divides within fifty years, he now acknowledges that personal transformation through verse does not guarantee external societal change, viewing communal animosities as far deeper than he previously thought. Following October 7, 2023, he experienced three months of poetic paralysis, broken only by compiling biblical verses containing the word for war. Abou Shmeiss similarly rejected superficial politeness as a foundation for dialogue. While acknowledging Israeli Jewish fears rooted in trauma, she insisted that her own terror—represented by armed soldiers and state violence against her family—must be met with equal candor. Effective communication, she argued, cannot rely on comforting compromises, but requires placing painful realities directly in front of one another. The discussion leaves unresolved whether cultural dialogue can withstand ongoing military destruction and societal hardening. While both poets demonstrated that Hebrew and Arabic can intertwine within literature, they cautioned that poetry cannot substitute for political justice or dismantle entrenched animosities without an unsparing confrontation with real-world violence.

[4:34] Almog Behar: My Arabic is mute / Strangled at the throat / Cursing itself without uttering a word / Sleeps in the earliest shelters of my soul / Hiding from relatives behind the Hebrew blinds / And my Hebrew is raging / Running between rooms and neighbor's balconies / Making its voice heard in public / Prophesying the coming of God and of bulldozers... [4:34] Almog Behar: Amal is hope / Hayati is my life / And when they meet / Between the lips of Umm Kulthum and my own ears / A great many longings will dig wells in my heart. [12:34] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: My English is not my first language. Neither my second, neither my third. It's my fourth language. And sometimes I mix between languages. [12:34] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: I dragged the words I haven't learned yet / My language drown / My teeth storming like the sea in a wintry day / I can't snare a single word with my palate / Raise my voice like a fishing rod / And bear a basket filled with mute tongues / Mute as fish / That I place / On the counter / In your kitchen. [29:45] Almog Behar: someone from outside the family, that the state decided that we wouldn't be able to talk with her in the last month of her life. [35:57] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: please don't translate it to Hebrew. We don't want Hebrew right now. [54:13] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: Eyes on the road / Hands on the wheel / Foot on the gas / Or the brakes / And the head and heart in Khan Yunis / And the blood that flows in Shuja'iyya / We are human being, human being / We are human being / In the rearview mirror I see my face / With eyes, nose, cheeks / Everything points to / I swear I look like a human being / We look like this / We are human beings / But they are slaughtering us / Slaughtering us / Slaughtering... [62:41] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: If I were a Jewish mother / And I had to send / My son to the army / I would fight / I would tie his tongue to his ears / I would glue my hands to his legs / I would hang my heart on his eyes / So he would not go. [65:18] Almog Behar: And the destruction of Jerusalem / Is amid the ruin of Gaza / And the destruction of Gaza / Is amid the ruin of Jerusalem / Amid the already dead / And the soon to be dead. [80:54] Almog Behar: It took us years to get rid of this Arabic. Why to go back? [86:40] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: I had opened the door. So please open the door to all the words and all the poems. That's it. [90:38] Ayat Abou Shmeiss: This way we can talk if we just put things not very nice cutey. No, we have to put the things as they are in front of the face of each other and also to remember to look ourselves also.

[0:09] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Hello, everybody. [0:10] Welcome My name is Jeffrey Veidlinger, [0:13] and I'm the director of the Raoul Wallenberg Institute [0:16] here at the University of Michigan. [0:21] Thank you all for joining us this afternoon. [0:24] Thank you in particular to the students who are with us. [0:28] I want to remind all the students, those of you who [0:30] are in ALA259, in the class that it revolves around these, [0:34] to go to your usual classroom afterwards for continuing [0:37] discussion. [0:38] And if there are students here who [0:40] are not enrolled in that class and would [0:42] like to continue the discussion afterwards with free food, [0:46] you can do so next door in the East Conference room over there. [0:53] There will be free food for students and the opportunity [0:56] to have moderated discussion about what we're seeing here [0:59] on the stage afterwards. [1:04] So again, thank you, and I encourage you to come. [1:07] Thank you as well to the staff of the Wallenberg Institute, [1:10] Miriam Mora, Eleanor Camp, Alexis Gideon, and Joe Johnston, [1:15] for helping make this event possible. [1:18] I want to begin today by noting the passing on Friday [1:23] of Irene Bader, a local Holocaust survivor, educator, [1:27] social activist, and inspiration for so much good in the world. [1:32] And some of us in this room attended her funeral [1:35] just a few hours ago today. [1:37] She was one of the founders of détenu, [1:39] a group of local Jewish and Palestinian women [1:42] who have been meeting together for decades to foster dialogue [1:46] and to share in each other's humanity. [1:50] She was also one of the founders of the Raoul Wallenberg Medal [1:52] and Endowment, which each year recognizes [1:55] an outstanding humanitarian who has shown how one person can [2:00] make a difference. [2:01] Irene regularly spoke to classes around the university [2:05] and shared her optimism in humanity, [2:07] despite the horrors that she had endured as a child. [2:11] She will be missed and leaves behind a remarkable legacy. [2:15] We were very pleased to have her speak [2:18] at the very first one of these events [2:19] that we did at our inaugural event [2:21] for the Raoul Wallenberg Institute, [2:23] and grateful for her support in the last two years [2:27] since we've been in existence. [2:29] The Raoul Wallenberg Institute was established [2:32] by the University in December 2023 [2:35] as part of a university-wide effort [2:38] to combat anti-Semitism and advance religious diversity [2:41] and inclusion on all three campuses. [2:44] Over the years, our mission has come [2:47] to embrace fighting, combating, and studying [2:50] ethnic and religious hatred of all kinds around the globe. [2:54] Raoul Wallenberg, the institute's namesake, [2:56] was in 1935 Michigan alum who worked with the United States [3:01] and Swedish governments in Budapest [3:03] to save thousands of Jews from deportation to the Auschwitz [3:06] death camp. [3:07] After the war, he was detained by the Red Army [3:10] and died in a Soviet prison. [3:13] The Samantha Wall dialogues are an important part [3:15] of our mission. [3:17] This series of conversations on contemporary issues [3:20] of consequence was established to honor [3:23] the memory of Samantha Wall, a passionate community [3:26] leader, committed grassroots organizer, and advocate [3:29] for interfaith conversations who was tragically murdered [3:32] in 2023 at the age of 40. [3:35] Thank you to her family, Margo and Doug Wall, [3:38] and Monica and Ben Rosen for helping us realize [3:41] the vision of this series. [3:44] This afternoon, on the Eve of October 7, [3:48] we've brought together three individuals committed [3:51] to the principles of dialogue and intergroup understanding [3:54] through poetry in order to help us address [3:57] the fundamental question of can Israelis and Palestinians talk [4:01] through poetry. [4:05] What we're going to do is we're going to have each of the poets [4:08] or two poets come up and read some poetry first, [4:13] and then I'll invite Stephanie up to engage in dialogue, [4:17] to have a conversation, to ask them some questions. [4:20] And after she's done, after she has asked a few questions, [4:24] we will be distributing index cards in which you [4:26] can write your own questions that Stephanie will then [4:30] ask our ask our guests. [4:34] So first I'll invite up Almog Behar. [4:38] Almog was born in Netanya in 1978. [4:41] He is a poet. [4:43] He is a poet, novelist, translator, researcher [4:46] and scholar. [4:47] Bahat lives in Jerusalem and teaches [4:49] in the Department of literature at Tel Aviv University [4:52] about the connections between Hebrew and Arabic literatures, [4:56] the connections between the Jewish liturgical poetry [4:58] traditions and modern Mizrahi literature, Jewish writing, [5:02] and Judeo-Arabic, and literary Arabic, and the way [5:05] Jewish writers negotiate with Islamic traditions. [5:08] He has published four poetry collections, a collection [5:11] of short stories, and a novel, many of which [5:13] explore his relationship with Arabic and his own Middle [5:17] Eastern roots. [5:18] So, Almog, I'll invite you up. [5:19] ALMOG BEHAR: Thank you. [5:20] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [5:27] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: You have your own? [5:33] ALMOG BEHAR: Yeah. [5:38] Thanks a lot, and I'm happy to be here. [5:44] And I will read first in Hebrew. [5:49] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Do you have a microphone? [5:52] Are you wearing the microphone? [5:53] ALMOG BEHAR: Yeah, as well. [5:54] I think it works. [5:55] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: You can hear? [5:57] AUDIENCE: No. [5:59] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Hold this the old fashioned way. [6:06] ALMOG BEHAR: [SPEAKING HEBREW] [9:25] My Arabic [9:28] My Arabic is mute [9:30] Strangled at the throat [9:32] Cursing itself without uttering a word [9:36] Sleeps in the earliest shelters of my soul [9:40] Hiding from relatives behind the Hebrew blinds [9:45] And my Hebrew is raging [9:47] Running between rooms and neighbor's balconies [9:50] Making its voice heard in public [9:53] Prophesying the coming of God and of bulldozers [9:58] And then it holds up in the living room [10:01] Thinking itself so open in the language of its skin [10:06] So hidden between the pages of its flesh [10:10] A moment naked [10:12] A moment later dressed [10:14] It curls up into the armchair [10:17] And begs itself for forgiveness [10:21] My Arabic is petrified [10:23] It quietly pretends to be Hebrew [10:26] And whispers to friends [10:28] Whenever somebody knocks at her gate [10:32] Ahlan Ahlan [10:33] And whenever a policeman passes it in the street [10:37] It produces an ID card and points out the protective clause [10:42] [SPEAKING HEBREW] [10:45] And my Hebrew is deaf [10:48] Sometimes very deaf [10:51] The translator into English was Dimi Reider [10:56] and into Arabic Rima Jaber. [11:11] And the first poem I translated myself into Arabic. [11:18] [SPEAKING ARABIC] [11:56] And it's translated into English by Shoshana Olidort and "Amal [12:02] Hayati" is one of the famous songs of Umm Kulthum [12:06] and my favorite. [12:08] Amal is hope [12:10] Hayati is my life [12:13] And when they meet [12:14] Between the lips of Umm kulthum and my own ears [12:19] A great many longings will dig wells in my heart. [12:24] Thank you. [12:26] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [12:34] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Thank you, Almog. [12:35] That's really lovely and great to hear the languages [12:38] and how they play off each other is really beautiful. [12:43] Our next speaker will be Ayat Abou Smeiss. [12:47] Ayat Abou Shmeiss was born in Jaffa in 1984. [12:51] She's a poet and an activist. [12:53] She's the author of two bilingual Hebrew Arabic poetry [12:56] collections, A Basket Filled with Mute Tongues from 2013 [13:01] and I am Two from 2018. [13:04] Her third poetry collection, An Unmothered Tongue, [13:08] is her first book in English and was just published, [13:11] I understand. [13:11] Just came out or is not yet. [13:13] Is soon coming out, is on its way out very soon, [13:17] and brings together poems from her previously published [13:19] two books alongside previously unpublished work. [13:28] Her poetry explores issues of identity, language, silence, [13:33] everyday life and duality, with a focus on women's experiences. [13:38] Alongside her literary work, she develops cultural projects [13:41] on Palestinian women, both contemporary and historical. [13:46] She heads the independent publishing house Mi'tan, and her [13:49] work has received recognition through awards for both her [13:52] literary writing and her feminist cultural activism. [13:56] So please welcome Ayat. [13:58] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [14:06] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: Well, marhaba. [14:08] Hello. [14:10] OK. [14:10] I'm so excited. [14:13] First, really thank you for inviting me. [14:18] Second, I just want to say that-- [14:21] I'm so excited-- that my English is not my first language. [14:26] Neither my second, neither my third. [14:28] It's my fourth language. [14:30] And sometimes I mix between languages. [14:34] So just be aware. [14:37] That's it. [14:38] I'm going to read two poems. [14:40] I'm going to read in Hebrew, Arabic and in English. [14:42] The Arabic, I just today decided to read it. [14:50] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [15:29] From Arabic, it was translated by [INAUDIBLE]. [15:34] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [16:06] The English was translated by Lisa Katz. [16:12] I dragged the words I haven't learned yet [16:15] My language drown [16:17] My teeth storming like the sea in a wintry day [16:22] I can't snare a single word with my palate [16:25] Raise my voice like a fishing rod [16:28] And bear a basket filled with mute tongues [16:31] Mute as fish [16:33] That I place [16:35] On the counter [16:36] In your kitchen. [16:38] Thank you. [16:39] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [16:44] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Thank you. [16:53] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: I told you that I too excited. [16:58] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [18:44] Again, the English translated by Lisa Katz. [18:48] A rock in the feminine form [18:50] I have a rock on the back of my neck, [18:54] Encased in silk [18:55] I don't remember who put it there [18:57] But I remember that I wrapped it myself [18:59] So it would at least look nice [19:02] I go everywhere with it [19:04] Disabled, but imagine without a wheelchair [19:07] People around me stare but don't comment [19:11] Apparently they think [19:14] That I like it or it's good for me [19:16] Perhaps because I wrapped it [19:19] I remember that it's been there [19:23] Since it was just a pebble [19:25] Thank you. [19:26] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [19:34] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Lovely. [19:35] Thank you so much. [19:36] And we can see the similarity in style, similarity [19:39] in themes a little bit and differences [19:40] that we'll talk about I'm sure, in the next segment [19:43] of our program. [19:44] So at this point, I'll introduce Stephanie Kraver. [19:48] Stephanie is a fellow at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute [19:51] and a scholar of modern Arabic and Hebrew literature [19:54] who specializes in transcultural exchange, expressions [19:58] of mourning, trauma theory, and translation. [20:01] Her current project, Writing Past Difference, [20:04] challenges the linguistic and sociopolitical cleavages [20:08] that characterize Arab Jewish writing and identity politics. [20:12] And so I'll call up Stephanie and Almog and Ayat, [20:16] and I'll turn things over to Stephanie. [20:19] And maybe use the microphones just in-- [20:25] We can see how-- [20:27] we can start with those and see if there's two of these. [20:40] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Whichever you prefer. [20:45] OK. [20:45] Wow, I want to start off by saying [20:47] that it's such an immense honor and privilege to be [20:50] in conversation with you both today, [20:52] and I'm so glad we could start with your words, [20:55] your words in Hebrew, Arabic and English, no less. [21:02] Before we delve into discussing your poems, [21:05] I thought we could commence our dialogue with you both, [21:07] talking a bit about your backgrounds [21:10] and how you found your way to writing poetry. [21:20] How did you each come to poetry as your form [21:23] of artistic expression? [21:29] Whoever wants to go first. [21:30] ALMOG BEHAR: You hold the microphone. [21:33] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: OK, so. [21:37] Here? [21:40] No? [21:42] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Yes, yeah. [21:43] That's OK. [21:45] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: So my background. [21:49] Actually, I don't have a lot of background. [21:52] Like in my house at home, we didn't have shelves or poetry [21:57] books. [21:58] I didn't open a Fadwa Tuqan books or any other and read it [22:04] and say, OK, I'm going I want to be like Fadwa [22:08] Tuqan or any other poet. [22:10] Actually, it was because I have some tensions [22:15] and some arguments, very foolish, with my mom [22:19] and to write it was just kind of a expression [22:25] and it just felt free. [22:28] I had the freedom to write whatever I want in the way [22:32] that I wanted. [22:34] And this freedom was something that it was missing a bit also [22:39] at my school because I went like to a very tough school. [22:43] And just in writing, it was kind of very free. [22:48] So I took it. [22:51] Thank you. [22:55] ALMOG BEHAR: Thank you. [22:57] So you started from the hardest question. [23:01] Where are we going from here? [23:08] I think I started to write from whenever I remember myself [23:18] from a very young age in a way of a personal secret. [23:35] You write to the drawer for decades, in a sense. [23:42] And in I think, for me, writing was an act of envy what you read [23:58] and you start to write, maybe also in the beginning, [24:05] in the footsteps of others or in the other models that you [24:12] see there. [24:18] But it was very secretive in that sense until much later [24:28] in my early 20s, when it became a way to negotiate with [24:37] the world directly and not as a secret. [24:43] And that was also the moment in which, of course, [24:49] I started to write in Hebrew and when it became in conversation [24:56] with the world, it was also the time [24:59] when thinking about the different languages [25:06] became a central question for me. [25:11] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you both so much. [25:13] On this topic of writing in different languages, [25:16] can you share more about your experiences writing in Israel? [25:20] Ayat as a Palestinian who writes in Hebrew, [25:23] and Almog as a Jewish Israeli who [25:25] upholds the importance of Arabic in his works. [25:28] What is the reception of your verses in Israel and elsewhere? [25:38] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: You know that when I started to write, [25:41] I didn't thought about it that it was in Hebrew, [25:44] or that I'm Palestinian who writes in Hebrew. [25:47] So for me, it was this is the language that I know very well. [25:54] I was surrounded by this language. [25:57] I love this language. [25:59] And I just started from very action [26:03] that it was normal for me, very nature. [26:10] But when I published my first book, [26:13] I realized that it was an issue that mean, [26:19] I remember after like publishing my book, the first one, [26:24] a journalist made an interview with me, and she asked me, [26:29] is writing in Hebrew like sleeping with the enemy [26:32] or something like that? [26:33] I don't know what the question was, but something like that. [26:36] And me like what? [26:39] Really, I didn't realize that this is an issue. [26:44] So I live in Jaffa, and, Jaffa it's a mixed city. [26:48] And from, I opened my eyes-- from the moment [26:53] that I opened my eyes, I were living with Jews. [26:57] Hebrew was everywhere. [26:59] The language was like everyday language were simple. [27:05] It wasn't kind of military language or something like that. [27:08] Doing shoppings in Hebrew, going to my doctor, [27:12] it was in Hebrew, to the clinic to the post office. [27:16] Now, if I remember, there is no single person in Jaffa [27:20] that know or use the word post office in Arabic. [27:24] We all use Doha in Hebrew. [27:27] You just need to understand how much the Hebrew was inside [27:31] of us. [27:33] But there is one more reason that maybe later I'll share it. [27:38] So I didn't realize at the first. [27:43] So when she asked me, I say, OK, this is an issue. [27:47] I'm Palestinian and I write in Hebrew, [27:51] and Hebrew is a language of, the official language of Israel, [27:57] the state of the Jewish. [27:59] And this is a state that occupies us. [28:02] This is a state that is racist. [28:06] It is racist. [28:07] This is a state that actually tells me where to go, how to go. [28:14] If I can meet my relatives in Gaza on the West Bank or not. [28:19] So I just understand it that it was very, very difficult for me. [28:29] But I couldn't not try write in other language. [28:41] I try to it wasn't so good. [28:46] So I say OK, because usually the Israeli society, when [28:52] they look at us, the Palestinian, [28:54] they looked at us through political lens. [28:58] Even before I write something, even [29:00] before I say something that opened my mouth, [29:04] they put us in a political frame, [29:08] in a political box, just the way I maybe look [29:11] or my language or my ID. [29:15] And I say, OK, I have here some tools [29:22] that I can use to just reach to the audience, [29:29] to just reach to Israeli side and to speak whatever I want. [29:33] I just can use these tools that I really have. [29:38] That's it. [29:40] Welcome. [29:45] ALMOG BEHAR: Thank you. [29:47] So for me, the question of language [29:52] was there at home before the street, [29:57] meaning that in my family, my mom was born in Baghdad [30:05] and came when she was five years old. [30:10] And I heard the Arabic of my grandparents speaking [30:14] with her and the aunts. [30:19] My mother would answer her grandpa, her parents in Hebrew, [30:25] as she was born in the name Samira. [30:31] Today she is Mirabella. [30:33] So names change identity. [30:36] When she was 10 years old at school, [30:40] the educator came to the house and asked her parents [30:45] to stop speaking with her in Arabic. [30:48] That was the policy in the '50s. [30:51] In a way like changing the languages of the people [30:56] through the children, through schools. [30:59] Her parents, of course, didn't stop [31:01] speaking with her in Arabic. [31:03] They didn't have another language. [31:05] But from that day, she stopped answering them in Arabic. [31:09] She became passive in Arabic. [31:11] She heard it, but answered in Hebrew. [31:15] So Arabic was one language that I heard at home, [31:20] and there were three other languages. [31:26] My father's father family came from Istanbul [31:32] and Judeo-Spanish Ladino was his language. [31:37] And my grandmother, my father's mother, [31:40] was born in Einbeck in Germany and spoke German. [31:46] And my grandparents fled at 39 to Denmark, to Copenhagen. [31:52] So my father spoke with his parents, Danish and German. [31:59] And what was clear for me was that those are languages [32:04] of home, but that it's preferred not [32:08] to hear them on the street or not to speak in them. [32:13] And anyways, it was very clear, like my parents expected [32:19] us to learn Hebrew and English, not any of the other languages [32:25] at home. [32:26] And in that sense, as a child, everything you meet is normal. [32:32] So you think that grandparents talk in different accents [32:37] than their grandchildren. [32:39] And, maybe my grandchildren will speak Albanian and I wouldn't [32:43] know their language. [32:46] There was a moment a bit later, when [32:49] I was 12 or 13, that I did tell my parents it's a waste. [32:56] Like, maybe I should learn one of the languages. [33:02] And they took the time. [33:06] They didn't answer me immediately. [33:08] Yeah, it's a great idea. [33:10] They thought for a week and then they said, you can study Danish. [33:18] And it was clear to me, the family spoke 1,000 years Arabic, [33:24] 500 years Judeo-Spanish, 200 years German, 10 years Danish. [33:31] it was clear to me that it's funny. [33:34] Now I regret it that I didn't study Danish at that stage, [33:38] but I didn't do it. [33:40] When I was 17, my grandmother from Baghdad, Louise, [33:47] was dementing and she forgot Hebrew, [33:51] and she went back to speaking only Arabic. [33:55] And that was the moment for me that I understood that it's not [34:00] natural, like my older cousins could speak with her in Iraqi [34:08] Arabic and I couldn't. [34:12] And that was the moment that I understood that someone [34:16] from outside the family, that the state decided [34:21] that we wouldn't be able to talk with her [34:24] in the last month of her life. [34:28] And that was when I decided to study Arabic, [34:32] but of course I was lazy, so it took me then, [34:35] like I decided at the age of 17, but I started when I was 23, [34:40] so it wasn't immediate, but it was clear to me to sum it up [34:50] in a sense that from that moment, [34:58] that as a writing person, like the poem I read, [35:06] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH], My Arabic is Mute, [35:08] like only a few months after I wrote it, [35:13] I understood that it starts with the words my Arabic, [35:18] that it's the first time that I could relate to Arabic as mine, [35:23] or to myself, as belonging to Arabic. [35:30] And I understood that if I wouldn't study Arabic, [35:34] if I wouldn't read or write, I would [35:37] continue to knock on this door. [35:45] I will continue to write variations on this poem. [35:52] So I didn't want to continue writing variations. [35:57] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you so much. [35:59] And to continue on this thread of the private and the public, [36:04] I'm wondering if you can talk a bit [36:07] about the current literary scene in Israel. [36:16] Are there still spaces where Palestinians and Jews [36:19] can share works, be in community, [36:22] and attend protests together? [36:25] What do the landscapes for solidarity and activism [36:28] look like after October 7? [36:34] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: Again, I guess. [36:36] Yeah, of course. [36:37] So comfortable to drink right now. [36:43] OK, so it's my second year that I'm away, that I'm in London. [36:51] But I can say that it's hard. [36:55] It's a hard scene. [36:58] As a head of the publishing house, [37:01] Mi'tan, I think what I wanted to do and what we wanted to do is [37:07] to give space and voice from Palestinian from Gaza. [37:15] And we was in this publishing house, [37:17] like, truly in this focused on these voices. [37:21] So I think a year or two years ago, I think it's two years ago, [37:29] I was me and my friend Rahel, Dr. Rahel Korazim, [37:35] we just made we were thinking about [37:37] made a kind of event, a literature event like poetry [37:41] event like voices from Gaza. [37:45] And I started to just send some messages to poets from Gaza. [37:51] And you can imagine how much it was difficult. [37:55] And just to ask them if we can show their poems. [38:02] So some of them say yes, but some of them just say, [38:06] but please don't translate it to Hebrew. [38:08] We don't want Hebrew right now. [38:10] And we put it in Arabic and Hebrew. [38:12] And we make a very big event in Jaffa, in Teatrot, Jaffa. [38:19] And it was like the first time when I saw during the genocide, [38:25] like Israeli and Palestinian together, [38:28] like gathering through poetry. [38:31] It was very excited. [38:33] Then I said, OK, maybe I'm going to do something with it, [38:36] but I didn't have so much money to do. [38:39] After had a poet from Gaza, we spoke about a couple of things [38:45] and he told me that he wanted to publish a poetry book [38:53] and to translate his poems to Hebrew. [38:57] Firstly, of course, he didn't tell me. [38:59] I want to translate my points to Hebrew. [39:01] He say, I want to translate it and that it will be published [39:04] in your publishing house. [39:05] I say, yeah, of course. [39:07] And then I ask him, which language. [39:10] He told me, like your book. [39:12] bilingual. [39:12] I say, yeah, but which language? [39:15] He say Arabic and Hebrew. [39:17] I say, are you sure? [39:19] He say yes. [39:20] It was very strong thing and yes, we did it. [39:26] And through this we made a lot of events for him [39:30] and it was really very powerful events. [39:36] But accept this that we made in this publishing house. [39:45] The scene was a little bit like disappointing. [39:51] I expected that it would be more organizing events and more [39:55] publishing about against the genocide in Gaza. [40:00] It wasn't so much, but it was one event [40:02] that it was really important from my Israeli friends that [40:06] made it. [40:07] And it was in Tel Aviv and all the events. [40:11] They just invited a lot of poets, Israeli poets mainly, [40:17] and it was really exciting because they [40:21] were reading against all this crimes and all these actions. [40:28] And I felt that of course it could be. [40:32] So maybe we need a little bit to look for and to search. [40:35] But it's definitely can be. [40:39] So this is my own experience with the literature scene [40:44] in Israel in during this horrible days. [40:49] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you so much. [40:56] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: I would say, when I'm optimistic, [41:01] I think that poetry can change. [41:06] And I think that the connection between Hebrew and Arabic [41:12] is the potential for changing. [41:20] When I'm pessimistic, I know that poetry changed me. [41:27] But it doesn't matter. [41:29] It doesn't mean that it can change the world [41:35] and the connection between Hebrew and Arabic [41:39] changed me and is transformative to many people. [41:48] But maybe not as optimistically. [41:58] I would say in a different way. [42:05] For Jews from the Arab world, there [42:13] was a lot of pressure to forget Arabic, [42:18] to erase Arabic in that sense. [42:23] If 1 million Jews spoke Arabic before '48, [42:29] it became dramatically less 20, 25 years later. [42:39] So when I'm thinking about the Jewish Arab culture, [42:47] the only way that was to return to Arabic [42:55] as a second and third generation to immigration [43:00] was through the Arabic of the Palestinians. [43:05] For us, the only way to learn, to return, [43:17] to communicating to thinking about creation in Arabic [43:24] was through Palestinian literature, Palestinian Arabic, [43:31] in a sense. [43:32] I didn't return to speak in Baghdadi Judeo-Arabic, [43:38] but speaking Palestinian Arabic. [43:43] So in that sense, it is something [43:50] that was very important to me and to many others. [43:56] And there is still potential with it. [44:01] Because I'm not everyday optimistic, [44:09] it's harder than that. [44:13] I think that for me, like 20 years ago, [44:21] I could say that if only the knowledge will [44:27] solve our problems. [44:29] I think that many of us across the world [44:32] see that the problem is not only knowledge. [44:37] It's not only that you open yourself and open others [44:43] to another perspective, and then the situation is resolved. [44:49] It's in a much deeper place in us [44:56] as humans or as societies, which is hard to solve. [45:03] So I didn't leave poetry because of all of that. [45:10] But if you would if I had answered [45:14] this question 10 years ago, I would end optimistically. [45:18] Like in 50 years, Hebrew and Arabic will merge and people-- [45:25] now, I don't know how to end my answer. [45:30] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you so much [45:32] for those very thoughtful words and reflections. [45:37] I wanted to give you an opportunity [45:41] to answer a couple questions about the poems you shared, [45:45] and then I'll give you the chance [45:47] to share a couple more poems, and then [45:49] we'll open up to the audience for questions. [45:56] So, Ayat, in your poem, A Rock in the Feminine Form, [46:00] you specify in your footnote that [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH], [46:03] the word for rock or stone in Hebrew, [46:06] is masculine and the Arabic is feminine. [46:09] I'd love for you to share more about this poem [46:12] and the diverse ways in which you're [46:13] thinking about gender here. [46:16] And Almog, I'll ask you a question as well. [46:19] In your poem, Amal is Hope, you play with language quite a bit. [46:23] Can you speak to how you decided to construct the poem [46:26] with both Hebrew and Arabic? [46:28] And also, what are the great many longings [46:31] that you describe in the work? [46:38] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: OK, so I think before that, [46:42] I need to say why I didn't have another option except [46:47] like to write in Hebrew. [46:52] So my mom, she's second generation of Nakba, [46:57] so she had a very hard time. [47:02] She couldn't study. [47:05] She's illiterate. [47:07] And when she became a mom, she say, [47:11] I want that my children will have the best education. [47:15] But you know why? [47:16] Because she wanted us to know to read. [47:19] And what she wanted us to read? [47:22] She wanted us to read the letters that the state sometimes [47:26] may send. [47:28] That means she never imagined about university. [47:31] She never imagined about poetry, literature or anything. [47:36] She just imagined about something [47:37] that is kind of terrifying and surviving. [47:42] So she was looking for a good school for us in Jaffa. [47:47] And at that time, that school was not so good [47:51] because there wasn't like, good-funded [47:53] and there were very few resources. [47:57] So she sent us to a French school. [48:01] And French school, of course, it's French. [48:06] It's a private school. [48:07] My dad had to work an extra hours. [48:10] And the Hebrew that they teach in this school, [48:14] they teach Hebrew for Jewish as first language, [48:17] as not in the Arab school, as Hebrew for Arabs, they call it, [48:23] or second language. [48:25] So in this school, I lost a little bit more [48:29] than a little bit my Arabic. [48:31] Maybe those who are Arabs and know Arabs [48:35] could a little bit see how I read a little bit the Arabic. [48:42] So sometimes I have mistakes and it wasn't my fault [48:46] and it wasn't my mom fault. Like mistake. [48:52] Fault it's in French, I think. [48:55] So it just kind my mom, she forced to do this [49:02] as an act of surviving. [49:08] So that is it. [49:10] So when I started to write in Hebrew [49:13] and realize these issues about me, [49:17] Palestinian and Arab natives, that speaks in Arabic [49:22] but write in Hebrew, I wanted to put my ID also in the poetry, [49:28] and not only by using the Arabic words. [49:32] For example, I use Jaffa sometimes [49:35] in my poems as an expression of Jaffa, the Palestinian city that [49:41] were before the Nakba. [49:44] And sometimes I use, for example, other words in Arabic [49:50] in a very kind of maybe situation [49:54] that it's like everyday thing, for example, [49:57] having lunch with my husband. [49:59] But I put this thing, for example, [50:01] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] or for example, salamu alaykum, [50:03] something like that. [50:04] But I wanted something more. [50:06] I wanted something that it is, or it [50:09] could put a zoom about the gender, my gender, and luckily [50:17] that Arabic and Hebrew are gendered language. [50:22] So I just thought that I can write the word rock, [50:28] that it in Arabic, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [50:30] it's in feminine form, and in Hebrew it's an masculine form. [50:36] So I just wrote it A Rock in the Feminine Form. [50:41] And that's what this poem just was born. [50:49] I hope that I answered. [50:50] OK, thank you. [50:56] ALMOG BEHAR: So the poem, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Amal is [51:03] Hope, was written in a way like in Hebrew and in Arabic about [51:12] the same time. [51:15] And in a sense, like the poem I read, [51:20] My Arabic is Mute, that was translated [51:24] by Rima Abu Jaber in Hebrew. [51:28] It has Hebrew and Arabic in. [51:32] It when it was translated into Arabic, it's monolingual. [51:38] It's only Arabic because the Hebrew [51:40] was translated into Arabic and the Arabic stayed in Arabic. [51:46] And when I saw this, I understood [51:53] that it's not only that I want to write Hebrew differently. [51:58] I want to write Arabic differently. [52:02] So I decided to translate myself or to write [52:07] at the same time in Hebrew and in Arabic. [52:10] And I was listening to Umm Kulthum. [52:15] And here, the poem in Hebrew. [52:24] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [52:28] In Arabic, when I read it, by the way [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [52:34] So [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] the word in Hebrew for hope, [52:40] when my grandparents used it, they said [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH], [52:46] Iraqi pronunciation of Hebrew. [52:49] Like in a sense, like the Arabic allows [52:52] me also to hear or to sound a different kind of Hebrew, [53:00] the Hebrew that I heard from them. [53:05] So that was, in a sense, like a stage for me [53:09] from translation, which is done outside of me, in a sense [53:17] and I accept it. [53:19] In a poem later on that I wrote it half in Hebrew and half [53:26] in Arabic. [53:26] I didn't bring it because it's untranslatable, but in a sense, [53:34] it was like for a second, maybe I [53:38] don't want to translate myself. [53:41] I want to write a poem in which each line will be half in Hebrew [53:47] and half in Arabic, and only Ayat will understand me. [53:54] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Wonderful. [53:55] Thank you both so much. [53:56] And I'll give you the opportunity [53:58] to share a couple more poems. [54:01] ALMOG BEHAR: OK, go ahead. [54:13] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: OK. [54:14] I realized that I don't have my [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]. [54:18] My glasses. [54:23] Just a moment. [54:26] Sorry. [54:33] Thank you. [54:51] A long poem and I need to see it well, but before that. [55:00] It's a very difficult poem, and before [55:03] that it's like the newest poem that I have. [55:06] I wrote it maybe a year ago or something like that. [55:10] Before that, I want to read out names of my family members [55:18] that were killed in Gaza range in age from 3 until 28. [55:27] [MENTIONING NAMES, AGES] 28, 25, 5, 3, 26, 6, 4, 13, [55:56] 22 years old. [55:59] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [61:15] I'll try to do it in English. [61:18] Eyes on the road. [61:20] Eyes on the road [61:22] Hands on the wheel [61:23] Foot on the gas [61:25] Or the brakes [61:26] And the head and heart in Khan Yunis [61:28] And the blood that flows in Shuja''yya [61:32] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [61:34] We are human being, human being [61:37] We are human being [61:40] In the rearview mirror I see my face [61:44] With eyes, nose, cheeks [61:46] Everything points to [61:49] I swear I look like a human being [61:54] We look like this [61:55] We are human beings [61:58] But they are slaughtering us [61:59] Slaughtering us [62:00] Slaughtering [62:01] My voice became louder [62:04] I repeated this [62:05] My eyes filled with tears [62:07] And my anger rose higher and higher [62:10] I tried to catch my breath [62:12] My tears fell [62:13] And I wiped them with my hand [62:16] I must see [62:18] I am driving [62:20] I'm on the road [62:21] Where there are people [62:23] There are human beings [62:27] I took a breath [62:28] I tried with all my trust to dismiss [62:31] This feeling that had taken over me [62:33] I got to work [62:35] Filled with anger, [62:37] Bitter [62:37] Ashamed [62:38] Here they are [62:40] Here they are [62:41] I'd like to know who was in Gaza [62:45] Who pulled the trigger [62:47] The trigger that set off a bomb [62:49] That felled a seven story building [62:51] In which human beings lived [62:53] Rania, the granddaughter, [62:55] Haron, Hind, Julia and Rania, their grandmother, [62:58] With whom I said before the war [63:00] At my own grandmother's home [63:03] Perhaps it's he [63:05] Or that one [63:07] Or that one [63:09] Or this one's husband [63:11] Or that one's brother [63:12] Or he [63:13] Perhaps his nephew [63:16] They they they [63:17] I lost my mind for a moment [63:20] Went to the restroom to rinse my face [63:22] In running water [63:23] I washed my face [63:26] We are human beings [63:28] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [63:30] I entered the classroom to teach [63:32] Arabic [63:33] I taught Arabic to Jews, [63:35] To Israeli, Hebrew speakers [63:37] I finished. [63:38] The principal called an urgent meeting [63:40] Spoke about pedagogy [63:42] He finished [63:43] Went out [63:45] One person said [63:46] Let's give round of applause to Moshe-- [63:49] not his real name [63:51] His return from months of serve duty [63:54] Our hero [63:56] And everyone clapped [63:59] Me, my hands still on the wheel [64:02] My eyes on the road [64:03] And my feet on the gas [64:05] Or the brakes [64:06] My head remains in Gaza [64:08] My blood flows in Shuja''yya [64:10] Where my grandmother was born in Gaza [64:12] Where Haron Hind and little Rania were martyred [64:16] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [64:17] And ever since, my eyes remained wide open [64:26] And it burns, ya rabby [64:30] It burns [64:31] Shukran. [64:33] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [64:46] If I were a Jewish mother [64:49] And I had to send [64:50] My son to the army [64:53] I would fight [64:55] I would tie his tongue to his ears [64:57] I would glue my hands to his legs [65:00] I would hang my heart on his eyes [65:04] So he would not go. [65:08] Shukran. [65:09] Thank you. [65:10] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [65:18] ALMOG BEHAR: I changed the order. [65:27] Tisha B'Av. [65:28] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [69:14] It was translated into English by Vivian Eden. [69:19] Tisha B'Av is a day of fasting in memory [69:23] of the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem [69:26] by Babylon, and then by the Romans. [69:30] Tisha B'Av 2025 [69:33] One [69:35] On prior eves of the 9th of Av [69:39] I would recite the book of lamentations [69:43] At one of the ruins of Jerusalem [69:46] And walking there. [69:47] I'd never greet [69:49] Anyone with shalom good day [69:53] Nor greet with shalom on my way back [69:57] But see all around me Jerusalem built up [70:01] All around surrounding my ruins [70:05] I would place a stone under my pillow at bedtime [70:11] So as not to doze off in a Jerusalem destroyed [70:16] And then awaken into seeing the city rebuilt [70:21] But rather to open my eyes entitled to grieve [70:27] And dreams of messiahs born and murdered [70:31] Would accompany me during my sleep [70:35] And at noontime on the day of the 9th of Av [70:40] I would look for seekers of peace in the streets [70:45] Who would meet me with shalom and greet [70:48] Them back with Shalom peace [70:52] Two [70:54] In this year, this Tisha B'Av today [70:59] The destruction isn't 2000 years old [71:03] The destruction is a hungry newborn babe [71:08] And a book is speaking in the present tense [71:13] But no spit remains on my tongue to grind its words [71:19] All the cities people sigh [71:22] They seek bread [71:24] And the bread is gravel in my mouth [71:29] As now not only is the soul in shreds [71:33] But the flesh is also in shreds [71:37] And how shall we lament the destruction [71:41] In the time of destruction [71:44] Three [71:46] And the dead won't die again [71:50] But how shall the living praise the Lord [71:54] The skies are the heavens [71:58] But is this land the Earth [72:01] The dead do not praise the Lord [72:05] Nor do any that go down into silence [72:10] And the destruction of Jerusalem [72:13] Is amid the ruin of Gaza [72:16] And the Destruction of Gaza [72:18] Is amid the ruin of Jerusalem [72:21] Amid the already dead [72:24] And the soon to be dead. [72:30] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [72:37] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [72:40] A Woman Awaits the Bombardment [72:46] To Manal Miqdad, a Gazan writer, translated from Hebrew [72:52] by Vivian Eden. [72:55] [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] [74:39] A Woman Awaits the Bombardment [74:44] Lying in bed at night in the long attempt to fall asleep [74:50] She thinks about the books she's taken into her library [74:55] The travel books and the nature books [74:59] should go to her best school friend [75:02] Who dreams about seeing streams and deserts next summer [75:08] The children's book still on her shelves [75:11] Should be taken to the orphanage the war will engender [75:17] The diaries she should ask for her father to burn [75:22] If the blast doesn't destroy them [75:25] And maybe also ask the neighbors [75:28] The books she bought in English and hasn't yet read [75:33] should go to her cousin [75:36] Who told her about his dream of living [75:40] The books she has lent to friends should remain with them [75:45] If they promise not to dog ear or write on their pages [75:51] And they'll choose to whom to bequeath them [75:55] in case of another bombardment [75:58] Here is her bed [76:01] No heroes surround it [76:03] Just fear in the nights [76:06] The books are mute, oblivious of to whom [76:11] they'll want to go after her [76:14] And she hopes to manage to fall into dreamless sleep this time [76:21] Undisturbed by the noise of the bombings [76:25] And disturbed by the noise of the games of the neighbor's [76:29] kids, [76:30] Whose tummies are wholly panic. [76:34] Thank you. [76:35] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [76:45] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you both so much [76:47] for those extremely powerful and moving verses. [76:53] I want to turn now to questions from the audience [76:57] for the last 15 minutes that we have. [77:02] There are a couple of questions about translation. [77:05] How much of your truth is lost in translation? [77:09] And can you speak a bit about the translation process? [77:24] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: For me, the translation, [77:26] it's another person enter and share [77:30] this space that I have me with the audience with the readers, [77:36] by writing. [77:38] So usually it's very intimate, me and the readers and there's [77:43] another person and it's difficult to me [77:46] a little bit because sometimes there [77:49] are meanings I'm not sure that it can last, totally lost, [77:52] but a little bit change. [77:55] So this is kind of thing that I feel that it always happen. [78:01] Some translators try really hard not to do this, [78:06] but sometimes it's just a language. [78:08] Sometimes it's just like the emotions of the poems. [78:10] So sometimes it happens. [78:14] But also like it's the opportunity that other people [78:18] that I cannot reach my own language that I write in to read [78:25] it and to think about it. [78:28] But usually, after I read a poem and from the moment [78:33] that I publish it, it's not so much mine anymore. [78:38] I can say it's mine, it's mine. [78:39] I can just hold it. [78:41] But everybody can took it and so also in the translation. [78:45] Thank you. [78:49] ALMOG BEHAR: Yes. [78:50] So I identify also with the fact that Gibran Khalil Gibran said, [78:58] our kids are not our kids or not our own. [79:02] Our poems are not our own after they go from us. [79:10] But also, in a sense, we talk many times [79:15] about what's lost in translation. [79:17] There is the quote of Salman Rushdie, [79:20] of what is gained in translation. [79:23] And I think that for me, the first experiences [79:27] of translation of working together [79:31] with the Palestinian translators in translating [79:36] into Hebrew, into Arabic. [79:38] And I did feel this thing that is gained through translation, [79:45] that is gained through the dialogue with them [79:49] like the options of how to translate [79:54] and what new meanings are gained by the poem [79:59] and I like sometimes those new meanings. [80:05] So I can tell that each of the times [80:07] that my poems were translated, I liked the translations. [80:14] It's like I see it, but in music. [80:19] Like someone writes and then someone else, [80:25] Malkin, writes the music for it or there is another version. [80:33] So the poem or song in that case, [80:38] gains another life in a sense. [80:41] It's not exactly the same. [80:45] Until now, most of the time I enjoyed the difference. [80:52] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you. [80:54] Another question about writing in Arabic. [80:57] You both mentioned trying to write in Arabic [81:00] but finding it difficult. Can you talk more [81:02] about the obstacles and also how are your poems received [81:07] by Arabic reading audiences? [81:16] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: He's not making my life easy. [81:27] Oh, my God, I forget the question. [81:29] Please, again? [81:30] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Yes. [81:31] How are your poems received by Arabic reading audiences [81:35] and also the difficulties of writing in Arabic. [81:38] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: So difficulty, I [81:39] think I spoke about it, but also it's [81:42] something like not only language the dialect [81:45] and the grammar and all of this, but also [81:47] something that I sometimes fight with myself with. [81:52] You know I fight with both languages, [81:54] but more with the Hebrew. [81:57] And for example, how they receive it. [82:02] I think firstly the Palestinian, for example, from Jaffa, [82:07] they didn't so much mind. [82:09] That mean they opened their arms and just [82:11] have me as I am with my Hebrew, with my everything. [82:15] Other Palestinians, they just what is she doing? [82:19] Why? [82:21] What she's trying to do, she's trying to do to be Israeli. [82:25] What she's trying to be what? [82:26] But then when they open the book, [82:28] they say, OK, wait a minute, there's something here. [82:33] She's not trying to boost something else that she is like. [82:36] So at first, it was a little bit of critics and something [82:40] very weird what you're doing. [82:42] But then they understand it. [82:46] So I'm glad that they open actually the book [82:49] and read the poems to reach and to understand. [82:56] ALMOG BEHAR: So I will answer maybe [82:58] not through poetry, but prose to continue, in a sense, [83:07] like the family story. [83:09] When I returned to Arabic, my parents I think, [83:15] would have felt better if I would go and write bilingually [83:19] with Albanian or another language. [83:24] So for them, it was, what is this obsession like. [83:28] It took us years to get rid of this Arabic. [83:31] Why to go back? [83:34] And the first moment that their perspective about that changed [83:41] was when a story of mine called Ana Min Al [83:44] Yahoud, it was born from the poem I read, [83:48] was published in Cairo in Arabic translation. [83:53] And at that moment, Cairo is still the capital of the world [84:01] and it was still something. [84:06] OK, so this obsession means something. [84:12] So that translation first for me was like the first translation [84:20] into Arabic outside Israel, because it's also [84:25] a question of translation. [84:28] Is a mode of going or opening to another audience, [84:36] but there are still borders. [84:38] So translation in a local newspaper or so on [84:44] is not really open to other audiences. [84:50] And in Cairo, Egypt, was stepping outside the local. [85:00] Later on when I worked with a translator [85:04] from Egypt, translated my novel and in the novel [85:11] there is a Judeo-Arabic, and there are parts in Hebrew [85:18] that are in rabbinical Hebrew. [85:23] So we had a long conversations about that. [85:27] Like, it was important for me to keep [85:31] the Judeo-Arabic inside the book in Arabic as well. [85:36] And he did like so it wouldn't look weird to the readers. [85:44] The letters are like on the side that it will be clear [85:49] that it's a different dialect that they are not [85:52] supposed to completely know. [85:56] And we spoke about the rabbinical sources [86:00] and we spoke about the kind of Arabic of Sufi sources [86:06] that can relate to them and be the equivalent [86:12] translation to them. [86:13] So again, it was in a sense, working anew, in a sense, [86:23] in the book, like editing some of the senses in it [86:28] in order for the translation to make sense [86:32] or even how do I want my book in Arabic to look like [86:37] or to sound like. [86:40] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Fascinating. [86:42] Thank you. [86:43] This is a question that's asking for advice. [86:49] What advice do you have for young poets who [86:52] want to write on controversial topics [86:55] and what advice do you have for writing to a wider audience? [87:00] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: Please. [87:06] ALMOG BEHAR: For advice. [87:08] I'm not sure which advice. [87:16] I will give one. [87:17] And so I'll do the first half. [87:25] I think that when we write-- [87:33] the main sense is not like I find it [87:38] at least like it's not that I have an issue [87:43] and then I write about the issue. [87:46] It's like writing is more connected for me [87:52] to the experiences I have that some of them relate to issues. [88:02] And then write as close as, in a sense, [88:09] I think I sometimes, in a sense, when it's hard for you [88:19] to speak with yourself, like to tell yourself the truth about. [88:25] I don't know if it's a shared experience or only mine. [88:29] But sometimes, there is a gap or there [88:33] are things that are hard for you to put into words. [88:39] And in a sense, those are many times [88:42] that I go to writing specifically more to poetry tree [88:48] than to prose. [88:50] And in that sense, I feel that if I [88:56] feel that I succeeded to tell myself [89:00] something new about something, I'm happy with that poem. [89:08] So it can be controversial or not controversial, [89:15] but if I feel that I succeeded in dialogue with myself [89:22] because most of the time, I don't succeed with dialogue [89:25] with myself, now you are about the wide audience. [89:30] You answer. [89:30] Let's see. [89:37] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: Really, I try to see, [89:40] just maybe when you're angry. [89:43] Write a lot. [89:43] Don't erase anything that you write. [89:46] This is a question like just to give an advice on this. [89:54] Try to create new words from other things, maybe something [90:02] that it's not usual. [90:05] And when you have words and poems that knock in your mind, [90:10] just write it down. [90:12] Because I remember that I have this period of time when [90:17] I was just on my way to work and I was driving in a motorbike. [90:23] And exactly in this minutes it was only maybe 15 minutes, [90:27] all the poems came here. [90:29] I had opened the door. [90:30] So please open the door to all the words and all the poems. [90:34] That's it. [90:34] Don't have anything else to say. [90:36] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you. [90:38] Before we end, I just wanted to turn back [90:40] to the very powerful poems that you just read and invite you [90:44] to share anything about these poems [90:48] and what it meant for you to read them today. [90:52] And there was a question about the strong language that [90:56] was used and perhaps you could say more about the poems. [91:05] AYAT ABOU SHMEISS: I think the poems, [91:08] like maybe the two like what I read, there were very direct. [91:18] I don't feel and I cannot try to explain them because it was [91:26] really, really direct. [91:28] But I can say that, for example, I [91:30] don't know if they refer to the poem Eyes on the Road. [91:34] So this poem, I wrote it when I was really, really, [91:39] really angry. [91:41] And I always hear from Israelis that they [91:45] say that they are scared from Arabs, [91:51] or they are scared from the Arab language, [91:53] or they are scared from us because there [91:56] are a lot of traumas, a lot of things. [91:58] And I can understand this. [92:00] I never argue with a person who is in front of me [92:04] and say he's scared because it's a feeling. [92:06] What you're doing with this is something else we can argue, [92:09] but I wanted just to put all my fears in a very direct way. [92:16] I scare, too, I scare when I see people with the uniforms. [92:22] The first day when I came to London, [92:25] I just was like, wow, there's no uniforms, really. [92:30] There's no guns. [92:32] These things, like with people, with uniform, always take me [92:40] to killing, always take me to blood. [92:43] And if it's my family, so of course. [92:46] So I wanted to put this. [92:47] So the Israelis that they always, for example, they [92:51] say the soldier is a brave, brave for you. [92:55] But for me, I have another very different opposite reality. [93:02] So I wanted to put it in a way not to educate a person, [93:07] just to put it. [93:09] We are human beings. [93:10] You are afraid from something. [93:12] I am afraid also. [93:13] It's a fear. [93:15] We just put it here and thus we can talk. [93:17] This way we can talk if we just put things not very nice cutey. [93:22] No, we have to put the things as they [93:26] are in front of the face of each other [93:30] and also to remember to look ourselves also. [93:34] That's it. [93:35] Thank you. [93:43] ALMOG BEHAR: I would say that first I [93:48] don't write poetry of the time. [93:52] And we don't-- now, I say we. [93:57] We don't write poetry about everything. [94:03] And, and sometimes it is hard to write poetry. [94:09] Sometimes, it's very easy. [94:11] But sometimes it's hard. [94:14] So I can tell about before the period [94:19] before I wrote the first poem I read, like in the first three [94:29] months after October 7, 2023, I didn't write poems. [94:35] And then I looked for all the verses in the Bible [94:43] with the word war in them and wrote them [94:49] and the first poem that I wrote at that period [94:55] was like with no word of my own, it [94:59] was mingling together all those verses with the word war. [95:08] And in that sense, it was a way for me [95:12] to return to writing without writing. [95:16] So sometimes, it's very hard to put yourself into words. [95:26] And this was like the process and then [95:29] I could write more directly. [95:32] STEPHANIE KRAVER: Thank you both so much. [95:34] And please join me in thanking our esteemed guests. [95:37] [AUDIENCE APPLAUDING] [95:50] JEFFREY VEIDLINGER: Thanks, everybody. [95:52] And thank you, Stephanie, as well [95:53] for leading such a great discussion. [95:56] And thank you both for coming. [95:57] And I just want to remind the students, again, those [96:00] in ALA.259 to go to your regular class [96:02] and those who want to participate [96:04] in the after discussion in the conference room East. [96:10] And our next event, I'll-- [96:13] whoops, I think there should be a slide here. [96:15] We'll on October 26-- [96:18] somewhere here. [96:20] I don't know which way the end is. [96:23] There we go. [96:31] On October 27, we will be having a Mary Sue [96:34] Coleman, the former president of the University [96:36] of Michigan, together with Brian Rosenberg, former President [96:39] of Macalester College, and Teresa Sullivan, [96:41] former President of University of Virginia. [96:44] Talking about should universities [96:45] strive to bridge division. [96:46] So hope to see you all again there. [96:47] And again, thank you to both of our visitors and Stephanie. [96:56] Thank you, all.