Munir Mezyed, the Poet, the Novelist, the Translator,
the Philosopher and the Rebel
Oh goddess of secrets
Who dances on the body of myth
All I can say about your charm
We always fall in the solar boat
Freemen...
(Munir Mezyed)
Considered by European intellectuals as the Ovid of the Arab world, due to the coincidence of both poets being exiled to Bucharest (Tomi during the days of Ovid), and Munir Mezyed who took refuge in the remote European country, solidly contributing to the culture of Rumanian literature, which habitually immigrates to France (Eugene Ionesco, Emile Cioran).
From this shield so close to the Muslim culture beyond the Levante, Munir Mezyed opens poetic panorama, Arabic poetry to the majority of western society.
Munir Mezyed is considered one of the greatest Arab poets and his works have been published all over the world as well as translated in twenty languages. His fertile creativity is immense: thousands of gathered lyrics “Written offers of crystal and amber”, as he refers to them. Hundreds of poems, eight novels, eleven novellas, various books on his travels and memoirs, as well as a certain number of essays, critiques, and philosophies.
An intellectual who despises narrow-minded nationalism and world-dividing religious fanaticism. His work, filled with energy and love, transpires between the passion celebration of the sensual body and the rebellious invocation of conscious objections towards all nations. Primarily those nations who disregard the importance of culture [art/learning] , and the freedom to create and therefore love.
His work carries the footprint [mark] of the poems of the Spanish Sefarad which constituted a link between Europe and the so-called “Orient”. That world which inspired Troubadours “provencal” as well as early poets and their verses, reestablishing the great tradition of the Arab, Persian, and Indian poetry within Islam long forgotten throughout the centuries. He particularly evokes the mystical poets of Spain in the 11th century, and the Sufi poets from Turkey all the way to Bengal.
The predominant themes in his collections are those of love. Of the human solitude facing God’s prodigality, expressed in the infinite array of emotions which continuously provoke man’s heart and the sublimation of erotic tension, bringing about the “Mezyedistic” poetry into extreme heights of sensuality and sublimation. Exaltation of the erotic act seen as a burning passion which placates and glorifies collectively.
There is a messianic fever steeped within all deeply personal conceptions of his writing. Mystic, sage, prophet, as within all true oriental tradition, for Munir Mezyed’s Love captivates the entire human being connecting him to God.
Not only as an emotion, but Love as man’s expanding reality which by imbuing and enveloping him creates superiority and excellence which leading him beyond every barrier between man and the divine.
An intense fusion if not subtle, an energy moving cosmos, forasmuch poetry, according to Munir Mezyed, has to be a perfect amalgamation of intellectual faith and sentiment, able to express across the beautiful representations of the joy of love. Therefore, one may well understand how Munir Mezyed, the great master of the new Eastern world, sees within the connection of the Loved-Lover the most complete experience of man’s realization: the experience, which even in the darkest moments of such a relationship, as in exile or loss of attachments which nothing can replace, faith’s vision is illuminated in his poetry.
By now Munir Mezyed is considered the bridge between the East and the Western world. His collection of poems bears witness to his [the poet’s] religious and philosophical thought, exploring aspects of precise cultural tradition, but not stopping there since his great ambition proposes to unify Arab-Muslim traditions returning them to their ancient splendors within a new formula, as well as incorporating the heritages of Western poetry.
According to Munir Mezyed poetry bridges the gap among all people of goodwill within various civilizations.
Munir Mezyed, attempts to resuscitate the sadness of his country’s folklore within the destruction of the intellectual class either exploited by the regime’s propaganda or completely eliminated. An advocate for the world’s youth to participate among one another through dialogue [speech] in universities and European cultural associations as well as in Cairo wherein sadly have been curbed by the tragic occurrences still occurring during the distressful Arab Spring.
In Italy he had already published a variety of new books translated both in Italian and English with the support of an Italian publishing house. Because of its cultural and freedom of thought Italy is a nation able to appreciate his internationalism and his humanitarian philosophy regarding peace and fraternity among all men with respect to all traditions.
An expert in the English language, he translated his own work originally written in Arabic. Munir Mezyed is the poet of the new Arab world, and is worthy to be the modern and independent leading intellectual of his country who fights not only with his work and his initiative of social character, but also with his proud political demeanor.
Munir Meyed was the first Arab writer to cast himself against extremism and corruption, demanding freedom and justice for all. Because of his liberal expressions he was prevented from publishing his poetry and Jordan’s extremist powers attempted to assassinate him. Mezyed was pressured into leaving his country for his voice to be heard, and now millions of Arabs in the Middle East love him and his writings, while many Arab critics view him as one of the greatest in the history of Arab poetry.
An Arab and a follower of Islamic religion, Munir Mezyed, referring himself as “the absent voice”, courageously narrates to the world all the crimes committed by Islamic fundamentalists in the last decades as read in the work “Crimes of The Century”. A ferocious condemnation against Arab academia culpable of covering in some way a violent temperament [attitude] derived from an erroneous interpretation of the sacred texts of the Quran.
“In the Middle East there are three voices”, he says. Two are very powerful [influential] and have been in power all these years. The first one is the one of the corruption of Arab regimes, and has served well over 60 years to maintain the ignorance of the people. The second was born from the lack of democracy and equality for everyone, and it is the voice of fundamentalism. This voice uses religion as a cover for evil crimes as far as to recruit adherents with its teachings.
The orators of this voice think and believe that power can be obtained through violence and creating conditions based on fundamental ideas (such as the Taliban in Afghanistan), regardless that Islam as a religion does not permit nor provide the use of violence in obtaining political or religious self-interests.
The third voice is absent, and doesn’t have the influential means to be heard. It is the voice that invokes democracy and human rights. This voice is a threat to the other two, insomuch that despite their powerful presence both attack it from every angle possible.
They accuse this third voice (the absent voice) of aligning with the Western world towards the destruction of the Islamic culture. Whoever gives vocalization [sound] to the third voice is either accused of being a spy or to be working for European organizations or other enemies of Arabs or Islam.
Munir tells of his own will toward redemption from the anguish he felt while crossing the river taking him into exile, and of his desperation when The Shaira condemned him to death because of his Chapter From The Poetry Bible. As in many of his litanies,
” Oh my brethren,
Afraid of being hated in by my tomb,
I recommend you not to bury me.(verse XXIV)
Still today Munir Mezyed courageously continues his path to justice in favor of peace, freedom, and the liberation of Arab literature, publicly affirming that Arab cultural institutions such as cultural circles, the Associations of Unions for Writers, the media, cultural festivals, and the Ministry of Arab Culture have lost whatever credibility they ever had. They solely serve the lobbying interests of those who do not keep within their heart culture [the arts], but serve to oppose freedom of thought and take advantage of creativity to propagandize a regime for the spread of extremism, violence, and hate.
These institutions and literary clubs are responsible for all the innocent blood spilled every day in our modern world. He claims and underscores that poets who have been exalted and awarded by such institutions are members of such a ferocious elite that their only objective is to subjugate poetry to a prescribed policy with the purpose of maintaining dominion.
Munir Mezyed has therefore decided to be [remain] a free poet without the support of promulgating special interests so that his poems of "crystal" may blossom for the freedom in all the points of the universe, as well as in faraway galaxies.
Munir Mezyed is above all a great lyrical poet, whose thought, inspired by other philosophical and religious concepts, places him among the greatest of the world’s mystical modern poets. I sincerely hope they award him with the 2013 Nobel Prize for Literature.
Doctor Graziella Ardia
Ed.D
(Traduzione in inglese Gia De Sales)
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