With our Muslim friends, families and countrypersons around the globe celebrating Eid al-Fitr, how fitting the Goethe Institute would award Germany's top tri-annual literary prize worth approximately 75K CDN to the man who describes himself as "the pagan poet," Syrian-born Adonis (a.k.a. Ali Ahmad Said Asbar).
The author of 30-plus works revered the world over, the now-81-year-old poet, critic and scholar attended a lovely ceremony in Frankfurt honouring his staggering achievements on Sunday afternoon which specifically designated his contribution to furthering the ideals and attitudes of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (on his birthdate, Aug. 28). Although primarily a literary accolade, it often looks further afield to identify those such as Sigmund Freud (1930) and Max Planck (1945) who also planted the seeds of a consummately literate and civilised garden of earthly delights:
"Like plants in glass gardens.
Wretched invisible creatures penetrate
the texture of space like dust — spiral victims."
— "A Grave for New York" (A Time Between Ashes and Roses; 1971)
Adonis, far more prescient than probably even he realized concerning the cradle of civilization, told Die Zeit in 2002, "Arab culture is brilliant when religion does not dictate how things should be. Everything in Arab culture that is free of that is extraordinary." The previous year, during an interview conducted by Deutsche Welle, he chillingly predicted:
"If the political situation in the Arab region does not change, if our leaders do not begin thinking about the people rather than how they can hold onto their power, then catastrophe will rain down in a way no one can begin to imagine."
Kudos! I stand with Palestinian-American literary theorist Edward Said who admiringly opined, of Adonis, that he is "today's most daring and provocative Arab poet." May the daring, provocative (and far too often) suppressed voices of this, the twenty-worst century (both here and elsewhere), continue to find the audiences so desperately in need of the world's poets urgent prophetic missives and messages. Perhaps the endlessly and equally deserving Leonard Cohen will scoop this same crown jewel three years hence?
Why not?
