Forest of Noise : Poems

Summary: "A powerful, capacious, and profound" (Ocean Vuong) new collection of poems about life in Gaza by an award-winning Palestinian poet.Barely thirty years old, Mosab Abu Toha was already a well-known poet when the current siege of Gaza began. After the Israeli army bombed and destroyed his house, pulverizing a library he had painstakingly built for community use, he and his family fled for their safety. Not for the first time in their lives. Somehow, amid the chaos, Abu Toha kept writing poems. These are those poems. Uncannily clear, direct, and beautifully tuned, they form one of the most astonishing works of art wrested from wartime. Here are directives for what to do in an air raid; here are lyrics about the poet’s wife, singing to his children to distract them. Huddled in the dark, Abu Toha remembers his grandfather’s oranges, his daughter’s joy in eating them. Moving between glimpses of life in relative peacetime and absurdist poems about surviving in a barely livable occupation, Forest of Noise invites a wide audience into an experience that defies the imagination—even as it is watched live. Abu Toha's poems introduce readers to his extended family, some of them no longer with us. This is an urgent, extraordinary, and arrestingly whimsical book. Searing and beautiful, it brings us indelible art in a time of terrible suffering. THE READ: Forest of Noise is vivid, accessible, and overwhelmingly powerful. It will be impossible for people to read it and not want to talk about it, share feelings about it, and attend readings by the author. BLOCKBUSTER NEWS POTENTIAL: Due to the media blackout, voices such as Mosab Abu Toha’s have been hard to come by during the war on Gaza. Clear, direct, and easy to understand, his work is a doorway into this traumatic time, one that has altered the political and emotional landscape of the United States. HUGELY ENGAGED AND IN-DEMAND AUTHOR: Abu Toha is the most visible literary figure frpm Gaza. In the last six months, following his arrest by Israeli soldiers, imprisonment, and sudden release, he has appeared on CNN, Democracy Now!, and the BBC, and been profiled in The New York Times and The New Yorker. He is well liked by hosts and producers and will be a much-requested guest when this book is out. LARGE AND ENGAGED PLATFORM: People have been following the war on Gaza on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok, where portions of this book have already appeared in posts and screenshots to enormous engagement numbers. On Instagram, Abu Toha has nearly 100K followers, who like and comment on his frequent posts. POWERFUL FANS: Abu Toha has an eager following; his short, biting poems and commitment to his cause are well suited to a large and ever-growing online platform. Many of the most popular American poets—from Ocean Vuong and Natalie Diaz to Kaveh Akbar and Naomi Shihab Nye—are his fans and will no doubt read with him. NBCC FINALIST AND MULTIPLE AWARD WINNER: Abu Toha’s first collection won the Palestine Book Award, the American Book Award, and the Walcott Poetry Prize, and was an NBCC finalist for poetry; this, his second, is even stronger, richer, and more varied in form, and will be sure to garner even more critical acclaim.Quotes:"A powerful, capacious, and profound book, rich in intelligence and lyric dexterity that fuses poetry's two great promises, wonder and testament, into crystalline focus."—Ocean Vuong, author of Time Is a Mother and On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous "The poems in Mosab Abu Toha's Forest of Noise are urgent, prayerful howls in the bleakest of nights. Necessary, and wrought out of both terror and truth, these poems sing and weep in a rough and haunting harmony. Abu Toha's work begs the reader to pay close attention as each poetic line is, at its heart, a lifeline to survival."—Ada Limón, US Poet Laureate, author of The Hurting Kind "This new collection from a renowned Palestinian poet offers a glimpse into life in a besieged Gaza and what it’s like to survive and find care, even hope, under the most dire of conditions."—"24 Works of Poetry and Fiction to Read This Fall," The New York Times "More than any news reporting, this heartbreaking collection makes vividly real the suffering in Gaza and what it’s like to face huge, ongoing loss....Abu Toha can be plainspoken, then turn around with a stark, horrific image that drops like hot coals.... One mourns with Abu Tohu as he asks his dead brother, 'Will my bones find you when I die?' Highly recommended."—Library Journal, starred review* "Mosab Abu Toha carries a vast library in his heart. His books hold the names of people and places covered in drones and rubble. His books hold letters, odes, reports, and elegies; generations of gardens and graves. Abu Toha opens his library to us in Forest of Noise. His poems resonate with undeniable immediacy upon a first reading and continue ringing more and more urgently with every subsequent reading. Abu Toha writes with a brilliance that makes anyone who encounters these astonishing poems both witness and kin."—Terrance Hayes, author of So to Speak "Heartbreaking, evocative, transformative poetry of witness to the horror of warfare. It happens in real time, as we turn pages. This is powerful, impactful poetry, a book you won’t soon forget. Forgetting is not an option. Buy two copies. One for yourself. Another for any soldier you might meet in the street."—llya Kaminsky, author of Deaf Republic "In Forest of Noise, his astonishing second book, Mosab Abu Toha is the essential poet embodying the humanity of Gaza, the precious hopes and dreams of all humans, the searing collective cries of children, the indelible honest conscience, the heart and soul. Miraculously he has continued speaking and writing through the horrific genocide of his people and beloved place. His elemental poems dissolve the empty rhetoric and posturing with simple, striking truth. Not blows. Who else among us founds a library in our early twenties? Today Mosab's books may be crushed, but his most powerful spirit is not."—Naomi Shihab Nye, author of The Tiny JournalistAuthor Bio: MOSAB ABU TOHA is a Palestinian poet, short-story writer, and essayist from Gaza. His first collection of poetry, Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and won the Palestine Book Award, the American Book Award, and the Walcott Poetry Prize. Abu Toha is also the founder of the Edward Said Library in Gaza, which he hopes to rebuild. He recently won an Overseas Press Club Award for his “Letter from Gaza” columns for The New Yorker.Author Residence: As of June 2023, Syracuse, NYAuthor Hometown: Gaza