In this catalogue, the enormous and eclectic collection of Dia al-Azzawi's artist's books is being published for the first time. Starting in the 1960s with the first examples of visual artworks that Azzawi conceived as books and his earliest reimaginings of entire poems in the book form, through to the shattering war diaries during the Gulf War, the introduction of limited-edition printed books and the experimental dissolution of the medium into sculptural objects, this is a lesser-known, private side of Azzawi's practice that has never been seen before. While the incorporation of Arabic text in paintings, sculptures and graphic design is one of the best-known features of the work of the Iraqi artist Dia al-Azzawi (born in 1939), these artist's books (dafatir, plural of daftar) more directly reflect Azzawi's love of literature itself and how it informs his overall practice.