Haidar Haidar
Haidar Haidar (, 1936 – 5 May 2023) was a Syrian writer and novelist. He aquired a wide reputation for his critical attitude towards political and religious institutions and his willingness to tackle controversial topics in a rational way. He published seventeen books of fiction, short stories, essays and biography, including Az-Zaman al-Muhish The Desolate Time, which was chosen by the Arab Writers Union as one of the best 105 books of the 20th century. Literary career 
His novel Walimah li A'ashab al-Bahr, translated as A Feast for the Seaweeds, was banned in several Arab countries, and even resulted in a belated angry reaction from the clerics of Al-Azhar University upon reprinting in Egypt in the year 2000. The clerics issued a Fatwa banning the novel, and accused Haidar of heresy and offending Islam. Al-Azhar University students staged huge protests against the novel, that eventually led to its confiscation. According to a BBC News report about the protests, "the plot centres on two leftist Iraqi intellectuals who fled the injustice of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in the late 1970s. The characters blame political oppression in the Arab world on dictatorships and conservative movements. In one of the most controversial extracts, God is described as a failed artist." In a 2019 interview for the magazine The Common, Hisham Bustani wrote about Haidar: "He has kept a fierce, critical distance from all sides: the dictatorship of the ruling regime in his country of Syria; the dictatorship of public taste and ‘conventions;’ the oppression of dogmatic ideology and the ruling party; the tyranny of power derived from religion." Haidar died on 5 May 2023, at the age of 87. Works

Novels 
 Al-Fahd (), 1968
 Az-Zaman al-Muhish (), 1973
 Walimah li A'ashab al-Bahr () 1983
 Maraya an-Nar (), 1992
 Shumous al-Ghajar (), 1996
 Haql Urjuwan (), 2000
 Marathi al-Ayyam (), 2001

Short stories 
 Hakaya an-Nawrass al-Muhajir (), 1968 
 Al-Wamdh (), 1970
 Al-Faiadhan (), 1975
 Al-Wu'ul (), 1978
 At-Tamawujat (), 1982 
 Ghasaq al-Aalihah (), 1994

Other works 
 Capucci (), 1978
 Awraq al-Manfa (), 1993
 Olumona ()

Death
Haidar Haidar died on 5 May 2023, at the age of 87. References

External links 

 Haidar Haidar's „Hymns of Death“, translated by Allen Hibbard and Osama Esber

 Haidar Haidar's „Winter“, translated by Allen Hibbard and Osama Esber

1936 births
2023 deaths
Syrian novelists
Syrian Alawites 
People from Tartus
Male novelists
Syrian male short story writers
20th-century Syrian writers
21st-century Syrian writers
20th-century male writers
21st-century male writers
20th-century short story writers