Considering the Women

by Choman Hardi

Choman Hardi’s Considering the Women explores the equivocal relationship between immigrants and their homeland - the constant push and pull - as well as the breakdown of an intermarriage, and the plight of women in an aggressive patriarchal society and as survivors of political violence. The book’s central sequence, Anfal, draws on Choman Hardi’s post-doctoral research on women survivors of genocide in Kurdistan. The stories of eleven survivors (nine women, an elderly man and a boy child) are framed by the radically shifting voice of the researcher: naïve and matter-of-fact at the start; grieved, abstracted and confused by the end. Knowledge has a noxious effect in this book, destroying the poet’s earlier optimistic sense of self and replacing it with a darker identity where she is ready for ‘all the good people in the world to disappoint her’. Hardi’s second collection in English ends with a new beginning found in new love and in taking time off from the journey of traumatic discovery to enjoy the small, ordinary things of life. Poetry Book Society Recommendation.

Genres: Poetry

72 pages, Paperback

Published October 22, 2015

About the author

Choman Hardi was born in Sulaimani, Kurdistan, and lived in Iraq and Iran before seeking asylum in the UK in 1993. She was educated in the universities of Oxford (BA, Philosophy and psychology), London (MA, Philosophy) and Kent (PhD, Mental health). She was awarded a scholarship from the Leverhulme Trust to carry out her post-doctoral research about women survivors of genocide in Kurdistan- Iraq. The resulting book, Gendered Experiences of Genocide: Anfal Survivors in Kurdistan-Iraq (Ashgate, 2011), was chosen by the Yankee Book Peddler as a UK Core Title.

Hardi has published collections of poetry in Kurdish and English

Reviews

[Sophie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phew. This collection is heart-wrenching. I am amazed at how Choman Hardi manages to convey such emotion with words - isn't that the definition of a great poet?! You can never really imagine what it is like to be someone else, especially someone who has experienced intense cruelty and a life so different to my own but these poems helped me to open up and consider a totally different perspective. The 'Anfal' sequence weaved a story into a set of poems and showed, honestly, how loss and pain leaves you confused and grieving.

"Sometime ago when I started, it was all clear. I knew
what had to be done. All I can do now is keep walking,
carrying this sorrow in my soul, all I can do is
pour with grief which has no beginning and no end."

With poetry collections I usually like to mention in my review what my favourite poems were. I tried with this collection, but the list ended up being most of the book! Haunting and brutal yet beautiful at times.

"Today is the day, she says,
There is no point in missing this sunshine
by remembering another.
No point in thinking yesterday was fine
when this moment is."

[Jude Brigley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this collection. Some reviewers praise its political dimensions, which I like in poetry, but what I enjoyed most was the human dimension of her poems. I loved how she captured the fabric of life, the thoughts in the head, the memories and experiences which make us who we are. I liked the way identity is explored through the the things, thoughts and memories we take with us.

[Meedia]

Force and violence are brothers
and women are alone.