VITA LUDENS editors

Ana Valdés, a well-known Uruguayan and Swedish writer and journalist, has visited Palestine, inclusive Gaza, numerous times as a journalist and a literary author. The result of her experiences is the poignant memoir “Gaza Blues”, a journalistic, scholarly and lyrical collage of writings, assembled to create a rich and meaningful mosaic of Gaza and Gazans. She writes:

I knew about Gaza before I first visited the city in 2003. I had read Huxley’s account and learned of a city conquered again and again, where I would see ruins of Greek temples and Arab mosques. You can get to Gaza via the Mediterranean Sea or via the borders with Egypt and Israel, which are marked by a high wall. Gaza has been destroyed and rebuilt several times over and Gazans boast of the immortal city that always rises when empires fall and leave ruins behind. Some of the children of the empires are absorbed by the city and in turn become Gazans with children who say – ‘We are from Gaza!!’ “Gaza Blues” is a tribute to the city that Italo Calvino wrote about, and that Marco Polo described to Kublai Khan.

“I breathe Gaza. The last thought before I fall asleep, Gaza is in my dreams and the thought of Gaza is the first thing that wakes up with me in the morning.”