26 Facts About Nizar Qabbani

Nizar Qabbani was born in the Syrian capital of Damascus to a middle class merchant family.

Nizar Qabbani was raised in Mi'thnah Al-Shahm, one of the neighborhoods of Old Damascus and studied at the National Scientific College School in Damascus between 1930 and 1941.

Nizar Qabbani later studied law at Damascus University, which was called Syrian University until 1958.

Nizar Qabbani graduated with a bachelor's degree in law in 1945.

In light of this controversy, Nizar Qabbani showed the book to Munir al-Ajlani, the minister of education who was a friend of his father and a leading nationalist leader in Syria.

In 1959, when the United Arab Republic was formed, Nizar Qabbani was appointed Vice-Secretary of the UAR for its embassies in China.

Nizar Qabbani wrote extensively during these years and his poems from China were some of his finest.

Nizar Qabbani continued to work in diplomacy until he tendered his resignation in 1966.

At the age of fifteen, Nizar Qabbani's sister died due to contested reasons.

Nizar Qabbani expressed his grief in an exceptionally moving poem titled Balqees.

Additionally, Nizar Qabbani used the death of his beloved Balqees to symbolize the death of Arab people in the Levant by their governments.

However, Nizar Qabbani expressed his love for all Arab citizens and cities from Mauritania extending to Iraq as one people connected by the same struggle and a rich past.

Nizar Qabbani was a vocal opponent of colonial and imperial western projects in the Middle East.

Nizar Qabbani had two sisters, Wisal and Haifa, and three brothers, Mu'taz, Rashid, and Sabah.

The latter, Sabah Nizar Qabbani, became the director of Syrian radio and TV in 1960 and served as Syria's ambassador to the United States in the 1980s.

Nizar Qabbani's father had a chocolate factory; he helped support fighters resisting the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon and was imprisoned many times for his views, greatly affecting the upbringing of Nizar into a revolutionary in his own right.

The family name, Nizar Qabbani, is derived from Qabban which means steelyard balance.

Nizar Qabbani eulogized his son in the famous poem "To the Legendary Damascene, Prince Tawfiq Nizar Qabbani".

Nizar Qabbani's daughter Hadba, born in 1947, was married twice, and lived in London until her death in April 2009.

Nizar Qabbani was moving between Geneva and Paris, eventually settling in London, where he spent the last 15 years of his life.

In exile, Nizar Qabbani continued to write poems and raise controversies and arguments.

At the age of 75, Nizar Qabbani died in London on 30 April 1998 of a heart attack.

Nizar Qabbani began writing poetry when he was 16 years old; at his own expense, Nizar Qabbani published his first book of poems, entitled The Brunette Told Me, while he was a law student at the University of Damascus in 1944.

Many of Nizar Qabbani's poems have been translated into English and other foreign languages, both individually and as collections of selected works.

Many of Nizar Qabbani's poems have been translated into Nepali by Suman Pokhrel, and are collected in an anthology tilled Manpareka Kehi Kavita.

Many of Nizar Qabbani's poems are translated into Hindi by Siddheshwar Singh, Arpana Manoj, Manoj Patel, Rinu Talwar and other translators.