ABOUT THIS BOOK

A dreamlike novel from Palestine that traces a restless soul’s journey through landscapes of memory, longing, alienation, and exile.

In this profound and evocative novel, acclaimed Palestinian author Hussein Barghouthi invites readers on an extraordinary, youthful journey through a landscape of memory, longing, alienation, and exile. Translated with great sensitivity by his son, Áthar Barghouthi, this deeply personal narrative unfurls as a stream-of-consciousness odyssey, blurring the lines between reality and dream. Haunted by a pervasive sense of loss, the prose, rich with poetic imagery, explores themes of displacement, identity, and the enduring shadows of a contested homeland.

The Third Bank of the Jordan River is a powerful, meditative work that defies conventional boundaries. With unflinching honesty, Barghouthi confronts the political through deeply human stories, capturing the restless search for meaning and the enduring human hunger for connection and freedom.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Hussein Barghouthi (1954–2002) was a Palestinian poet, writer, essayist, critic, lyricist, and playwright, born in the village of Kobar in Ramallah. Áthar Barghouthi is a Palestinian translator, writer, editor, and cultural worker who holds a degree in English Language and Literature.

REVIEWS

Praise for The Blue Light:
“The Blue Light, like Hussein himself, is split, scattered, and schizophrenic. It’s full of contradiction, but its embrace of these contradictions is perhaps what makes it . . . ‘golden.’”—Full Stop

Praise for Among the Almond Trees:
‘A spiritual memoir that’s concerned with the mutability and impenetrability of language and life, Among the Almond Trees creates a taxonomy of presence and absence that makes continuity from seeming opposites, one that’s filled with nuance and largesse for both the Palestinian people and the nearer pain of Barghouthi’s own illness and looming death.’—Foreword Reviews

Praise for Among the Almond Trees:
‘In Barghouthi’s work, nescience and speculation are preferred over certainty and assertion. Nevertheless, the Israeli presence and its suppression of freedoms loom over Among the Almond Trees as Barghouthi portrays himself wandering through the land of his youth. But he seems to be asking us to regard this oppression as a recurring element in human history—while the individual perceives in his solitary history the perennial struggles discovered in world literature.’—Ron Slate, On the Seawall

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Third Bank of the Jordan River