Arabian Love Poems, new edition
  • 1999/225 pages

Arabian Love Poems, new edition

Nizar Kabbani, translated by Bassam K. Frangieh and Clementina R.Brown
Paperback: $22.00
ISBN: 978-0-89410-881-5
Ebook: $22.00
ISBN: 978-1-62637-706-6
Nizar Kabbani’s poetry has been described as "more powerful than all the Arab regimes put together" (Lebanese Daily Star). Reflecting on his death in 1998, Sulhi Al-Wadi wrote (in Tishreen), "Qabbani is like water, bread, and the sun in every Arab heart and house. In his poetry the harmony of the heart, and in his blood the melody of love". Arabian Love Poems is the first English-language collection of his work.

Kabbani was a poet of great simplicity—direct, spontaneous, musical, using the language of everyday life. He was a ceaseless campaigner for women’s rights, and his verses praise the beauty of the female body, and of love. He was an Arab nationalist, yet he criticized Arab dictators and the lack of freedom in the Arab world. He was the poet of Damascus: "I am the Damascene. If you dissect my body, grapes and apples will come out of it. If you open my veins with your knife, you will hear in my blood the voices of those who have departed."

Frangieh and Brown’s elegant translations are accompanied by the striking Arabic texts of the poems, penned by Kabbani especially for this collection.

Nizar Kabbani was born in Syria in 1923, to a traditional, well-to-do family. He served in Syria’s diplomatic corp for more than twenty years (1945-1966), but settled for political reasons in London. He died on April 30, 1998; at his request, he was buried in Damascus. Bassam K. Frangieh is professor of Arabic at Yale University. Clementina R. Brown translates and interprets from Arabic, French, and Spanish into English.

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