To Write Poetry During Gaza is…?

• In Event: Yugoslav Responsibility III: Writing against Genocide

Abstract

Using Adorno’s insights into the (im)possibility of poetry after Auschwitz as a starting point, this presentation investigates poetry during Gaza, where genocide against the Palestinians is an ongoing process, active even when the guns cease. In order to explore poetic responsibility in not just opposing
genocidal violence, but in contributing in meaningful ways to the Palestinian struggle for liberation, the paper uses the response of poetry to Bosnian genocides as a crucial precedent.

Author

• Selma Asotic, U of Massachusetts Amherst