Adonis is the pen name of Ali Ahmad Said Esber (Syria / France, 1930). He is by far the best-known poet in the Arabic language, and in the eyes of many, he is also the most important. Adonis was born in Syria, and moved to Lebanon and then to France as a young man. There he became an innovator. He broke with the tradition of the formal structure of Arabic poetry and experimented, with free verse and prose poems, becoming an example to later generations. Adonis has long been seen as one of the main contenders for a Nobel Prize in Literature.

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