Salim Barakat (b. Qamishli

Qamishli

Qamishli is a city in north eastern Syria on the border with Turkey, adjoining the Turkish city of Nusaybin, and close to Iraq. It is part of the Al-Hasakah Governorate, and is the administrative capital of the Al Qamishli District within the governorate....

, 1951) is a Syria

Syria

Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

n writer of Kurdish origins

Kurds in Syria

Kurds are the largest ethnic minority in Syria making up 10% of the country's population. Most of them are Sunni Muslims; there are also Yazidi and Yarsan Kurds in Syria and small numbers of Christians and Alawis. They face routine discrimination and harassment by the Syrian...

. He was brought up in Qamishli

Qamishli

Qamishli is a city in north eastern Syria on the border with Turkey, adjoining the Turkish city of Nusaybin, and close to Iraq. It is part of the Al-Hasakah Governorate, and is the administrative capital of the Al Qamishli District within the governorate....

 in northern Syria and spent most of his youth there. In 1970 he moved to Damascus

Damascus

Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...

 to study Arabic Literature

Arabic literature

Arabic literature is the writing produced, both prose and poetry, by writers in the Arabic language. The Arabic word used for literature is adab which is derived from a meaning of etiquette, and implies politeness, culture and enrichment....

 but after one year he moved to Beirut

Beirut

Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...

 where he stayed until 1982. While in Beirut he published five volumes of poetry, a diary and two volumes of autobiography. He moved to Cyprus

Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...

 and worked as a managing editor of the prestigious Palestinian journal Al-Karmel, whose editor was Mahmoud Darwish

Mahmoud Darwish

Mahmoud Darwish was a Palestinian poet and author who won numerous awards for his literary output and was regarded as the Palestinian national poet...

. In 1999 he moved to Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

, where he still resides.

His works explore his own Kurdish culture

Kurdish culture

Kurdish culture is a group of distinctive cultural traits practiced by Kurdish people...

 and chronicle their plight and history, as well as the Arabic, Assyrian

Assyrian culture

-Celebrations:Throughout the years, Assyrians celebrate many different kinds of traditions within their communities, with the majority of the traditions being tied to religion some way...

, Armenian, Circassian

Adyghe people

The Adyghe or Adygs , also often known as Circassians or Cherkess, are in origin a North Caucasian ethnic groupwho were displaced in the course of the Russian conquest of the Caucasus in the 19th century, especially after the Russian–Circassian War of 1862.Adyghe people mostly speak Adyghe and most...

 and Yazidi

Yazidi

The Yazidi are members of a Kurdish religion with ancient Indo-Iranian roots. They are primarily a Kurdish-speaking people living in the Mosul region of northern Iraq, with additional communities in Transcaucasia, Armenia, Turkey, and Syria in decline since the 1990s – their members emigrating to...

 cultures. His earliest major prose work, Al-Jundub al-Hadidi ("The Iron Grasshopper"), is an autobiographical narration of his childhood in Qamishli. The book explores the violent and raw conditions of his early adolescent life, suffused with nostalgic feelings for the Kurdish land and culture. The first part of the book's lengthy subtitle translates to, "The unfinished memoir of a child who never saw anything but a fugitive land."

Barakat is considered one of the most innovative poets and novelists writing in the Arabic language

Arabic language

Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...

. Stefan G. Meyer has described his style as "the closest by any Arab writer's to that of Latin American

Latin American literature

Latin American literature consists of the oral and written literature of Latin America in several languages, particularly in Spanish, Portuguese, and indigenous languages of the Americas. It rose to particular prominence globally during the second half of the 20th century, largely due to the...

 magical realism" and has called Barakat "perhaps the master prose stylist writing in Arabic today". Due to his complex style and application of techniques taken from classical Arabic literature, his influence has been almost one of a "neoclassicist

Neoclassicism

Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...

."

Novels

• (1985) The Sages of Darkness
• (1987) Geometric Spirits
• (1990) The Feathers
• (1993) The Camps of Infinity
• (1994) The Astrologers on the Tuesday of Death: Crossing of the Flamingo
• (1996) The Astrologers on the Tuesday of Death: Cosmos
• (1997) The Astrologers on the Tuesday of Death: The Liver of Milaeus
• (1999) Debris of the Second Eternity
• (2001) Seals and Nebula
• (2003) Delshad
• (2004) The Caves of Haydrahodahose
• (2005) Thadrimis
• (2006) Novice Dead
• (2007) The Sand Ladders
• (2008) The Anguish of Indescribable Perplexing Intimacy in the Voice of Sarmak
• (2010) The Agitation of Geese
• (2010) Crushed hoofs in Haydrahodahose
• (2011) Vacant sky over Jerusalem

Poetry

• (1973) Each Newcomer Shall Hail Me, So Shall Each Outgoer
• (1975) Thus Do I Disperse Moussissana
• (1977) For the Dust, for Shamdin, for Cycles of Prey and Cycles of Kingdoms
• (1979) The Throngs
• (1981) The Cranes
• (1983) By the Very Traps, by the Very Foxes Leading the Wind
• (1991) The Falconer
• (1996) Recklessness of the Ruby
• (1997) Confrontations, Covenants, Threshing Floors, Adversities, etc.
• (2000) Hefts
• (2005) Lexicon
• (2008) The People of Three O'clock at Dawn on the Third Thursday
• (2009) Translating Basalt
• (2011) The Flood

Autobiographies

• (1976) Church of the Warrior
• (1980) The Iron Grasshopper
• (1982) Play High The Trumpet, Play It the Highest

Collections

• (1992) Diwan
• (1999) Pharmacopoeia (Collected essays)
• (2007) Poetical Works

Children's books

• (1975) Narjis
• (1980) Who Guards the Earth?
• (1980) Sleep