Dareen Tatour

Dareen Tatour is a Palestinian poet who gained international renkown when she was arrested in her home at night by Israeli forces after publishing a poem on the internet title ‘Resist, my people, resist them’. Dareen was accused of inciting terrorism, her work was banned from publication, and she was jailed amidst an international furore over brutal censorship by the Israeli state. She was released after a campaign for her freedom, including a protest letter by nine Pulitzer Prize winners, and she chronicled the severity of her prison experiences in her book, ‘My Threatening Poem – the Memoir of a Poet in Occupation Prisons’, which was published first in English by the small indie publisher Drunk Muse Press in 2021. Her subsequent collection of poems – ‘I Sing From the Window of Exile’ – juxtaposed her poems in Arabic with English translations, as she reflected on her struggles to adjust to a new life in Sweden, the trauma brought on by the violence of her prison experiences, and the strength she drew from the humanity and courage of fellow Palestinian women prisoners. Dareen has now returned to live with her family in the West Bank, and continues to work and write.