Fairoz
By Moniza Alvi
()
About this ebook
Moniza Alvi
Moniza Alvi was born in Pakistan and grew up in Hertfordshire. After working for many years as a secondary school teacher in London, she is now a freelance writer and tutor, and lives in Wymondham, Norfolk. All her poetry is published by Bloodaxe. Her most recent titles are Fairoz (2022), Blackbird, Bye Bye (2018); her book-length poem, At the Time of Partition (2013); Homesick for the Earth, her versions of the French poet Jules Supervielle (2011); Europa (2008); and Split World: Poems 1990-2005 (2008), which includes poems from her five previous collections, The Country at My Shoulder (1993), A Bowl of Warm Air (1996), Carrying My Wife (2000), Souls (2002) and How the Stone Found Its Voice (2005). The Country at My Shoulder was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot and Whitbread poetry prizes, and Carrying My Wife was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. Europa and At the Time of Partition were selected as Poetry Book Society Choices in 2008 and 2013 respectively and both were shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize. Moniza Alvi received a Cholmondeley Award in 2002. A collection of her poems was published in Italy by Donzelli Editore in their Poesia series in 2014, Un mondo diviso, translated by Paola Splendore.
Read more from Moniza Alvi
Blackbird, Bye Bye Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBad Machine Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Related to Fairoz
Related ebooks
A God at the Door Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Critical Study of the Novels: Of Rokeya Shakwat Hossain Zeenuth Futehally Iqbalunnisa Hussain Tara Ali Baig Attia Hosain Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLuck is the Hook Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road to the Spring: Collected Poems of Mary Austin Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAlarum Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ten: the new wave Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Certain Noble Plays of Japan: From the manuscripts of Ernest Fenollosa Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEverything Begins Elsewhere Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A Study Guide for Judith Wright's "Drought Year" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTelepathologies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Over the Moon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCollected Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEkphrasticism: Painted Words Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhy to These Rocks: 50 Years of Poems from the Community of Writers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFlood Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHourglass Years: A Poetry Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLove Minus Love Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDream Tales and Prose Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRailsplitter Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn The Sanctuary Of A Poem Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTime Stitches: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGuard The Mysteries Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Lyn Hejinian's "yet we insist that life is full of happy chance" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLemon Hound Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tiger Girl Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMONUMENT Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Book For My Brother Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ground Water Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Wish Book: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCircadia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Poetry For You
The Iliad of Homer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sun and Her Flowers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad: The Fitzgerald Translation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selected Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Way Forward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDante's Inferno: The Divine Comedy, Book One Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beowulf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prophet Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Love Her Wild: Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pretty Boys Are Poisonous: Poems Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Bell Jar: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Leaves of Grass: 1855 Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (ReadOn Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of John Keats (with an Introduction by Robert Bridges) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Thoughts: An Exploration Of Who We Are Beyond Our Minds Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Collection of Poems by Robert Frost Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Edgar Allan Poe: The Complete Collection Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Daily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Everything Writing Poetry Book: A Practical Guide To Style, Structure, Form, And Expression Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Gilgamesh: A New English Version Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Winter Hours: Prose, Prose Poems, and Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related categories
Reviews for Fairoz
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Fairoz - Moniza Alvi
1
MONIZA ALVI
FAIROZ
Fairoz is a book-length poetry sequence in which Moniza Alvi explores an imagined teenage girl’s susceptibility to extremism. The book’s fragmented, collaging narrative draws together fairytale elements, glimpses of Fairoz’s thoughts, and pieces of dialogue. A folkloric representation of God and the devil acts as a wry counterpoint, touching on questions of morality. Fairoz is a powerful portrayal of human vulnerability.
‘She is a skilled storyteller, recounting the extraordinary in the voice of the everyday, so that we accept the miraculous as something we need…the overriding impression is of a deft, restrained language carrying ideas with a metaphysical wit and seriousness.’ – Leonie Rushforth, London Magazine
‘One of the few British poets whose work could currently be described as essential reading, not least as we try to grasp what fractures of cultural difference might have contributed to the July 7 bombings.’ – Tim Robertson, Magma
‘Europa made the most difference to me as a writer. It showed me one way of writing about trauma and violence, how to circle around a central concern and explore it from different angles.’ – Kim Moore, The North
Cover painting: Conflict (1975) by Laila Shahzada (1926-2004) PERMANENT COLLECTION OF THE JORDAN NATIONAL GALLERY OF FINE ARTS2
3
MONIZA ALVI
Fairoz
5
CONTENTS
title page
Driving the devil away
In the present tense
Indoors
Hair
What do you do with a heap of stones?
‘It was a house of female habitation’
Questions in the wood
The Devil and the gleams
The Devil’s soup
The white cat
Not enchantment
In the morning
Home
Fairoz and Annat
As summer
School lunchtimes
Listening to Fairoz and Tahir
Pilgrims
Does the Devil know what he is?
The notice
When they meet
A story of God and the Devil
Ripe
Wolves-of-the-woods
What runs under her skin
She pictures Jannah
Absent and present6
Her absences
‘where the swarm is thickest’
The dark patch
The plants
It was long ago
A conversation
A punch
Ice age
He’s ‘v v sorry’
The short long story
The loping wolf
A tale reduced to a sliver
God’s eyelids
This woman will speak to you, he says
The bride
Gone
A