Dictionary of Midnight

The book will be heavily promoted, especially in Kurdistan, where we will believe there will be a significant audience for the translation of Pashew’s work. Translator Alana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse runs an art and culture center in Kurdistan. Events will be held there and elsewhere in Kurdistan. LaBrosse will also be in California in the spring for events.

The sharp, lyrical verse— personal and political— of a poet that paints a literary window into his contested homeland, Kurdistan.With a foreword by National Book Award-winning author William T. Vollmann Dictionary of Midnight collects almost 50 years of poetry by Abdulla Pashew, the most influential Kurdish poet alive today. Pashew's poems chart a personal cartography of exile, recounting the recent political history of Kurdistan and its struggle for independence. Poet-translator Alana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse worked with the poet to select and translate his most iconic poems, balancing well-known, politically engaged contemporary Kurdish classics like "12 Lessons for Children" with the concise love lyrics that have always punctuated his work.