Adonis

Adonis’ influence on Arabic literature has been likened to that of T. S. Eliot in the English-speaking world. Yet alongside this spearheading of a modernist literary revolution, the secular Syrian-born poet is also renowned for his persistent and staunch attacks on despotism across the Arab world. In these conversations with the psychoanalyst Houria Abdelouahed, Adonis brings into sharp relief the...

Heralded as the greatest living Arab poet, Syrian-born Adonis is also a staunch critic of violence and despotism in the Islamic world. In Prophecy and Power, he explores the nature of political power in Islam by focusing on the figure of the prophet Mohammed as both a political and mythical leader. In conversation with Houria Abdelouahed, Adonis examines the Qur’anic...

The first major career-spanning collection of the poems of Adonis, widely acknowledged as the most important poet working in Arabic today. “Poetry for [Adonis] is not merely a genre or an art form but a way of thinking, something almost like mystical revelation.”—Charles McGrath, New York Times Born in Syria in 1930, Adonis is one of the most celebrated poets...

The landmark poetry collection that transformed 20th-century Arabic poetry, in a brilliant new translation by Kareem James Abu-Zeid and Ivan Eubanks. Written in the early 1960s by Adonis, 'the most eloquent spokesman and explorer of Arabic modernity' (Edward Said), Songs of Mihyar the Damascene is widely considered to be the apex of the modernist poetry movement in the Arab world,...