Parallel Language Edition
May Ziadeh's poetry is the poetry of alienation and connection; the poetry of eternity and ephemeral existence; of intimate inner life in enclosed spaces and of distant horizons yearned for; of shared journeys and of solitude.
Her poetry transcends classification, for it is uniquely hers. She sees profoundly and the truths she speaks, even though clothed in poetic jewels and piercing insight, do not shy from the realities of life. Her poetry explores worlds of joy and sorrow, of the best and worst in us: the Shadows and Light of human existence.
The hand of a little child in all its innocence becomes, in her voice, a meditation on violence and war. Her watch becomes a gateway to cycles of eternity, to cycles of human hope and despair. Her works are like 'still lifes' - into which she weaves her inner world and the universals we all share.
For the first time, in this parallel language edition, an English translation brings Shadows and Light, May Ziadeh's most outstanding poetic collection, to the English-speaking world.
"... May stands out as would a beacon lighting its surroundings ... I love her because of her high intelligence and keen conception of the true values of life ... Frankly I do not feel I am worthy of her." Kahlil Gibran, author of The Prophet
"A true romantic, Ziadeh's literary style is characterized by fusing emotion with fantasy and romanticism with objectivity ..." Lubna Khader, journalist
"May's voice was unlike any other... her words had a musical poetry to them that captivated the mind as much as the ear ..." Taha Hussein, icon of Arabic letters
"May Ziadeh [is] the foremost woman in Arabic literature of the first three decades of the [twentieth] century ..." Soheil Bushrui, professor and poet
Publisher: Aldila Press Pty Ltd (https://aldilapress.com)
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May Ziadeh was a leading author, poet, essayist, journalist, and feminist intellectual of the Arab Literary Renaissance, in a literary career that spanned decades. Her prolific output spanned social criticism, groundbreaking feminist biographies, and philosophical works, including Equality (1923) and Shadows and Light (1923).
Born in Nazareth to a Lebanese Maronite father and a Palestinian mother, she completed her schooling in Lebanon before settling in Cairo in 1908. A polyglot who initially debuted in French under the pen name Isis Copia, she chose Arabic as her literary home, becoming a pioneer of modern Arabic prose poetry.
From 1913, Ziadeh hosted her renowned Tuesday literary salon in Cairo for nearly two decades. It was a space that brought men and women together as intellectual peers and became a seminal center of Arab thought, attracting luminaries like Taha Hussein, Ahmed Shawqi, and Abbas Mahmud al-Aqqad.
Ziadeh's personal life was marked by an iconic twenty-year epistolary romance with Kahlil Gibran, followed by profound isolation and personal tragedy in her later years. Celebrated as the "genius of the East," she left an enduring legacy that bridged East and West through a universal, deeply human vision.