Sania Saleh

Sania Saleh (1935–1985; Arabic: سنية صالح) was a Syrian writer and poet, who wrote and published several poetry collections.^[1] Some of her poetry has been translated into English by Marilyn Hacker.^[2]

Sania Saleh
Born	1935 Masyaf, Hama Governorate, Syria
Died	1985
Title	Poet, writer
Spouse	Mohammad al-Maghut

Biography

Sania Saleh was born in the city of Masyaf, in the Hama Governorate, Syria to Ismaili parents. She met the Syrian writer Mohammad al-Maghut in the 1950s at the house of the Syrian poet Adunis in Beirut. In the late 1960s she married Mohammad al-Maghut while she was still a student in the college of literature at the University of Damascus, Syria.^[1] They had two daughters together and named them Sham and Salafa.

In 1985, Sania Saleh died at a hospital in Paris after having battled an illness for 10 months.^[3]

The Egyptian poet Iman Mersal has lamented that fact Saleh's poetry was not more widely known when Mersal was young:

I grew up thinking that there were no modern Arab female poets for me – until I read Sania Saleh, just three years ago or so. And this makes you wonder: why such poetry was not available to me as a young reader? I think if I′d read her early in my life, it would have been fantastic.^[4]

Works

• Tight Time (1964) (original title: al-Zaman al-Dayeq)
• Execution Ink (1970) (original title: Hebr al-Idam)
• Zikr al-Ward (1988)
• Dust (1982) (original title: al-Ghubar)

Poetry translated into English

• "Autumn of Freedom". ArabLit Quarterly. Translated by Marilyn Hacker. Fall 2018. Republished in Marilyn Hacker (2019). Blazons: New and Selected Poems, 2000-2018. Carcanet. pp. 56–59. ISBN 9781784107161.
• "The Deluge". Shenadoah. 70 (2). Translated by Marilyn Hacker. Spring 2021.
• "The War of Memory". Shenadoah. 70 (2). Translated by Marilyn Hacker. Spring 2021.

Awards

• An-Nahar newspaper award for best modern poem (1961)^[5]
• Hawaa magazine award for short stories (1964)
• Al Hasnaa magazine award for poetry (1967)