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9780231215947

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Reviews

Static Forms is one of the most dynamic, invigorating, erudite books I’ve read about contemporary Middle Eastern literature. Alon teaches us how to read the story of Palestinian “ongoing Nakba,” or violence in Egypt, Israel, and Lebanon, with an eye toward the literature of resistance. It is the literary form, she shows, that exposes the “suspended present” of occupation and oppression, and how they cannibalize our past, present, and future. -- Nitzan Lebovic, author of <i>Homo Temporalis: German-Jewish Thinkers on Time</i>

Static Forms is one of the most dynamic, invigorating, erudite books I’ve read about contemporary Middle Eastern literature. Alon teaches us how to read the story of Palestinian “ongoing Nakba,” or violence in Egypt, Israel, and Lebanon, with an eye toward the literature of resistance. It is the literary form, she shows, that exposes the “suspended present” of occupation and oppression, and how they cannibalize our past, present, and future. -- Nitzan Lebovic, Professor of History and Holocaust Studies, Lehigh University Bold and original, Static Forms creates a whole new way to read and think about modernist Middle East literature. Alon brings together for the first time Hebrew and Arabic prose that attempts to narrate the present, illuminating key historical-political moments in Middle Eastern and global modernities with theoretical sophistication and great sensitivity. -- Shachar Pinsker, professor of Middle East Studies and Judaic Studies, University of Michigan Static Forms offers a provocative new way to link literary style and affect to political conjunction. When the present confronts us as a violent impasse or vacancy, how do writers give it significance? Shir Alon’s shrewdly comparative readings of Hebrew and Arabic novels provide surprising answers. -- Robyn Creswell, Yale University

Author Information

Shir Alon is an assistant professor in the Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Minnesota.

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