Our speech with holes like worn-out shoes is dead. The unnamed verse below, written in 1970, seems as if it could have been written yesterday in half a dozen nations – and in some U.S. Youth by the millions in every Arab country, and each generation since his fame and liberal spirit spread, still compose their declarations of love and new life in the light of Nizar Qabbani’s poetry. His progressive and secular politics and outlook alienated him from some conservative trends in the Arab world, awash in “blood oil” or religious extremism. By profession he was a diplomat for the Syrian government through the mid 1960s. Thereafter, he expressed resentment of male chauvinism and often wrote from a woman’s viewpoint and advocated social freedoms for women. The suicide of his sister, who was unwilling to marry a man she did not love, had a profound effect on Qabbani. He earned a reputation for daringness with the publication in 1954 of his first volume of verse, “Childhood of a Breast,” whose erotic and romantic themes broke from the conservative traditions of Arab literature. Through a lifetime of writing, Qabbani made women his main theme and inspiration.
He is one of the most revered contemporary poets in the Arab world.” His poetic style combines simplicity and elegance in exploring themes of love, eroticism, feminism, religion and Arab nationalism. Wikipedia summarizes Nizar Qabbani (Ma– April 30, 1998) as follows: he was “a Syrian diplomat, poet and publisher.
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