Cultural Memory and Exilic Perspective on Home and Identity; A Historico-Literary Analysis of Mahmoud Darwish's Works

Abstract

The thesis deals with the history of the last seventy years of Palestinian struggle for the establishment of their identity as a sovereign nation-state as it is reflected through the poetic and prose works of Mahmoud Darwish. Owing to his persistent role as the mouthpiece of the Palestinian sentiments, Darwish has come to be known as the Palestinian national poet. In the present study, Darwish’s literary outpour is seen in the context of a long history where different claimants have contended to establish their entitlement to the sacred land of Palestine. The historical dimension is an important part of the Arab literature in general and Palestinian literature in particular where the struggle for independence and democratic rights has consistently been nabbed by the colonial masters in the past and the neo-colonial regimes of the present time. In the context of Palestinian/Israeli conflict, the UN-sanctioned ‘two-state’ solution is being systematically undermined by the ultra-orthodox, US-supported Israeli government that openly refuses to admit the legal and historical rights of the Palestinians. While history is being documented by the resourceful western academia and other institutions with more or less ulterior motives, it becomes ever more pertinent to highlight the Palestinian cause as reflected through various modes of their own cultural production. Indigenous literary and non-literary voices must be heeded to for a holistic understanding of the human condition in Palestine. Analysing Mahmoud Darwish’s writings in their historical backdrop is thus an attempt to understand the history of Palestinian national identity through the focal lens of a representative poet. The present research is interdisciplinary in nature using a historico-literary framework of study that takes its lead from intertextuality as well as new-historicism. The purpose of investigation is a deeper understanding of Palestinian struggle through Darwish’s works as he tackles the challenges of exile and cultural memory to realize the ideals of home and identity. It is hoped that the present treatise would encourage further interdisciplinary researches where other literary texts are explored in their historical and political contexts.