Hoda Marmar and M Lynx Qualey choose ten Arabic books to spark love.
The Annual Anti-Valentine’s Day Poem: ‘The Wall of Lost Chances’
And I will raise the sheet that covers your bed so it becomes a flag.
On the 45th Wedding Anniversary Mourid Barghouti & Radwa Ashour
“Alone, between sky and earth, I think of Radwa.”
For Valentine’s Day: Love and Anti-Love Poems, and Things Between
Valentine's Day is just two days off. Nothing yet to scribble in your card?
Three Arabic Poems Chosen for 50 Greatest Modern Love Poems List
The poetry team at the Southbank Centre worked for a year to come up with this international list of the best 50 love poems of the last half-century.
For All the (non)-Lovers Out There This Valentine’s Day: Yehia Jaber’s ‘How I Became a Suicide Bomber’
There are plenty of poems out there this February for the lover or recovering lover. But for the one who is not yet in recovery -- or doesn't want to be -- excerpts from Lebanese poet Yehia Jaber's "How I Became a Suicide Bomber," translated for the first time by Thoraya El-Rayyes.
For Valentine’s Day: Give Me Great Love, Give Me Great Passion, and Give Me Great Darkness, Too
If you're looking for long Arab love stories with which to woo your beloved, Ahdaf Soueif listed five for The Guardian back in 2009 (1) Latifa al-Zayyat's The Open Door; 2) Naguib Mahfouz's The Cairo Trilogy; 3) Colette Khoury's Days with Him; 4) Enayat el-Zayyat's Love and Silence, and 5) Layla al-Juhani's Jahiliyya). Myself, I … Continue reading For Valentine’s Day: Give Me Great Love, Give Me Great Passion, and Give Me Great Darkness, Too
Call for Submissions: ‘Arab Love Stories’ – ‘قصص حب عربية’
Banipal 44, set for release in the summer of 2012, will be dedicated to "Arab Love Stories." The call for submissions is open to all Arab-identified authors. This issue will be juried by a special editorial committee. According to the Banipal website, the committee members are: The Iraqi author Salima Salih The Algerian publisher Assia … Continue reading Call for Submissions: ‘Arab Love Stories’ – ‘قصص حب عربية’
Qabbani Love Poems for Your Valentine’s Day
The Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani (1923-1998) was one of the most popular Arabic-language poets of the twentieth century, well-known for his focus on eroticism and love. As Bassam Frangieh notes in his introduction to Arabian Love Poems, a collection of Qabbani's work he co-translated with Clementina Brown, "To say that Kabbani was the most popular and famous of contemporary Arab poets is not to claim that he was the most skilled."
