Listen to a sample
A Dress of Locusts
- Author
- Safa Khatib
- Narrator
- Safa Khatib
- Publisher
- Bloomsbury Publishing
- Publish Date
- 19 June 2025
- Run Time
- 41 minutes
- Format
- Audiobook
- Genre
- Poetry / Poems
Not available in your country
We don't have the rights to sell this audiobook where you are. If it's already in your library you can still listen to it in My Books.
What to expect
Safa Khatib’s poems open my eyes, sharpen my ears' SAFIA ELHILLO
'With a meditative clarity, Khatib calls us to account for the ways we have – and continue to – turn eyes away from the historic now' NIKI HERD
An electrifying debut collection exploring language and revolution, by an extraordinary new poetic talent
Woven from threads of Aramaic, Spanish, Ancient Greek, Sumerian and Arabic, A Dress of Locusts is an unforgettable song cycle in which the living and dead sing back and forth to one another. Here, Safa Khatib journeys across the possibilities of language and self, asking us to dwell in the thresholds between the 'old' and the 'new'.
Critics Review
-
Composed with bold, economical precision, Khatib’s debut comprises a blend of dream, riddle, parable, and prophecy. The book’s title is spoken by Ishtar, the Mesopotamian goddess of love and war. This is, incredibly, an apt punctum for the book’s meditations on desire, faith, and ancient continuities between the so-called “West” and “(Middle) East”. Khatib’s wildly ambitious imagination collapses those divisions and defies contemporary geopolitical premises. The book’s idiosyncratic spirituality and vision are matched by its delightful, playful earthiness. Essential reading
Poetry Book Society (Summer Bulletin)
-
I am spellbound by these poems, their heartfelt percussion, their clean slice of precision. Safa Khatib’s poems open my eyes, sharpen my ears. Here is a poet I will read in every eternity
SAFIA ELHILLO, author of Girls That Never Die
-
Khatib’s voice is, as you might expect, powerfully polyphonic; brilliant . . . A Dress of Locusts isn’t just about language, or myth, or memory, however – it’s about how those things press on the body, reconfigure desire, and reshape our faith. All of which gives the book, despite its slim size, a very powerful charge indeed
Buzz
-
This slim but powerful collection makes connections that are seldom voiced and collapses eras of world history into each other . . . Khatib breaks open the easy complicity of so much modern discourse
Pulsar
See more reviews See fewer reviews
-
A Dress of Locusts suggests that memory can be ephemeral and speech an effort not quite realized. And yet, for Khatib, these realities are no excuse. Without admonishment, but with a meditative clarity, Khatib calls us to account for the ways we have – and continue to – turn eyes away from the historic now
NIKI HERD, author of The Stuff of Hollywood
-
Safa Khatib’s poems take us everywhere and nowhere. They take us to the river and bring us back thirsty. They are suspended in the in-between – in the pockets of the body, in late visits to the ruins, in the phone calls demanding a life together. Khatib does not shy away from Empire by hiding in the interior, she blurs both topographies into one
MONA KAREEM, author of I Will Not Fold These Maps
User Reviews
No reviews yet.
Details
- Author
- Safa Khatib
- Narrator
- Safa Khatib
- Duration
- 41 minutes
- Release Date
- 19 June 2025
- ISBN
- 9781526667946
- Format
- Audiobook
- Publisher
- Bloomsbury Publishing
- Genre
- Poetry / Poems
Synopsis
Bloomsbury presents A Dress of Locusts written and read by Safa Khatib.Safa Khatib’s poems open my eyes, sharpen my ears' SAFIA ELHILLO'With a meditative clarity, Khatib calls us to account for the ways we have – and continue to – turn eyes away from the historic now' NIKI HERDAn electrifying debut collection exploring language and revolution, by an extraordinary new poetic talentWoven from threads of Aramaic, Spanish, Ancient Greek, Sumerian and Arabic, A Dress of Locusts is an unforgettable song cycle in which the living and dead sing back and forth to one another. Here, Safa Khatib journeys across the possibilities of language and self, asking us to dwell in the thresholds between the 'old' and the 'new'.
About xigxag
xigxag is an independent, UK-based audiobook platform and the UK's only B Corp certified audiobook company. We offer nearly 150,000 audiobooks, all with professional human narration. No AI-generated voices. xigxag is rated an Ethical Consumer Best Buy for audiobooks and a top-rated ethical bookshop.
There is no subscription. You buy the audiobooks you want, you own them permanently, and prices start at $13.95. The more you listen over the year, the less you pay per book, and there is always a selection in Listen for Less from $7.95. You can also send audiobooks as gifts using our audiobook gift cards or in-app gifting.
Every audiobook on xigxag has honest reviews covering both the book and the narration, and our community features make it easy to share what you are listening to, discover what others recommend, and find your next listen.
Download or stream on iOS, Android, or in your browser. Browse the full catalogue at xigxag.co.uk.