Late Palestinian poet and journalist Mahmoud Darwish gestures during his show in the northern Israeli city of Haifa, 15 July 2007 [GIL COHEN MAGEN/AFP via Getty Images]
Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008) was one of the most important Palestinian and Arab poets who contributed greatly to the development and progress of Arabic poetry. He was known as one of the writers of the resistance and his poems espoused the Palestinian cause. His poetry has been translated into several languages and his Arabic collections have sold more than a million copies.
Darwish’s poetry was deep, philosophical in meanings and connotations. He was the philosopher of poets and the poet of philosophers through his introduction of symbolism to modern Arabic poetry, employing myths and historical personalities in his work. This remains open to existential issues that affect humanity, in a way that opens Arab poetry to new and multiple worlds through what critics can read from the poems, with interpretation and deconstruction of the connotations of each symbol in its aesthetic, historical and philosophical dimensions.
![Late Palestinian poet and journalist Mahmoud Darwish gestures during his show in the northern Israeli city of Haifa, 15 July 2007 [GIL COHEN MAGEN/AFP via Getty Images]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/GettyImages-75428903.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1)
