ADONIS (Ali Ahmad Said)

Born in 1930 in Qassabin.

Syrian poet and literary critic who was a leader of the modernist movement in Arabic poetry in the mid-20th century. Adonis received a degree in philosophy at the University of Damascus in 1954 and served in the Syrian military from 1954 to 1956. He then moved to Beirut, where he received a Ph.D. from St. Joseph University in 1973. In 1957 he helped Yusuf al-Khal found the avant-garde poetry review Shi`r, and in 1968 he launched the more radical journal Mawaqif. His early volumes of poetry included Dalilia (1950), Qasa'id ula (1956; "First Poems"), and Awraq fi ar-rih (1958; "Leaves in the Wind"). In the 1960s Said helped create a new form of Arabic poetry, characterized by elevated diction and complex surrealism in poems like Aghani Mihyar ad-Dimashqi (1961; "Songs of Mihyar of Damascus"). He was nominated for the Nobel Literature Prize in 2003.

Last updated: 18 December 2003