"This selection of new Arab poetry highlights the work of different generations of poets from around the Arab world - men and women from as far as Morocco to the West and Iraq to the East." "Their writings span the last two decades of the 20th century, but the new forms, styles and subject matters they are experimenting with translate into a departure from the old and an explosion of new poetry that is innovative, expressive and daring. This is also a personal journey for most as they explore their lives, surroundings and ethnicity - often multiple - and cultural complexities, with an intensity of images and emotions. Illustrating this is the fact that some poems were not even written in the 'native' Arabic but in French or English, demonstrating the multi-cultural influences which have come to shape modern Arab poetry this century."--Jacket.