KNOXVILLE – Arab American poet Khaled Mattawa will give a lecture on Arabic poetry’s forms, prosody and subject matter on Tuesday, Oct. 6 at 7pm in 1210 McClung Tower. On Wednesday, Oct. 7, Mattawa will give a reading of his own work in 1210 McClung Tower.

Mattawa is the author of four books of poetry, Tocqueville (New Issues Press, forthcoming 2010) Amorisco (Ausable Press, 2008), Zodiac of Echoes (Ausable Press, 2003) and Ismailia Eclipse (Sheep Meadow Press, 1996). 

He has translated eight books of contemporary Arabic poetry by Saadi Youssef, Fadhil Al-Azzawi, Hatif Janabi, Maram Al-Massri, Joumana Haddad, Amjad Nasser, and Iman Mersal. Mattawa has co-edited two anthologies of Arab American literature.

Mattawa has been awarded the PEN award for literary translation, a Guggenheim fellowship, the Alfred Hodder fellowship from Princeton University, an NEA translation grant, and 3 Pushcart prizes.
 
His poems have appeared in Poetry, The Kenyon Review, Antioch Review, Best American Poetry, and many other journals and anthologies.