UAE | Heritage and Culture
1,000 poets to take part in Dubai poetry festival
Dubai hosts 1,000 poets to participate in Dubai International poetry festival 2009.
- By Fatma Salem, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:25 January 25, 2009
- Image Credit: Francois Nel/Gulf News
- Ali Saif Al Sha'ali said at the press conference the poetry event will act as a forum for performers to "remove barriers and speak the language of poetry."
Dubai: One thousand poets from 45 countries are expected to participate in the first edition of the Dubai International Poetry Festival 2009, the Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation announced on Sunday.
The festival will be held from March 4 to 10 at Madinat Jumeirah House of Poetry in Shindagha, Dubai.
Nigerian playwright and poet Wole Soyinka, winner of 1986 Nobel Prize, will address the opening session of a festival themed "A Thousands Poets - One Language".
His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, ordered the launch of the Dubai International Poetry Festival last July, under the theme "A Thousand Poets - One Language", to make Dubai a synonym for poetry.
The festival aims to reflect the universal nature of poetry as a bridge between cultures, regardless of nationality, beliefs, or economic circumstances.
The event is considered the first of its kind in the region and it will combine various forms of local, classical and modern poetry, in terms of size and concept.
The different languages used by poets will not be an obstacle to the public as it will be able to follow translation - Arabic and English - on the big screens provided.
According to organisers, the Dubai International Poetry Festival came to light to embody the dream of all poets around the world, gathered under one roof.
"Five successive annual festivals is our objective as we aim to attract more poets to Dubai in the coming years," said Jamal Khalfan Bin Huwaireb, a prominent UAE poet and chairman of the organising committee for Dubai International Poetry Festival.
Ali Saif Al Sha'ali, CEO of the festival, said: "Poetry is the most transparent language for communication; it will act as a forum for poets from around the world, to remove the barriers of borders and speak the language of poetry."
UAE participants include Dr Mana Bin Saeed Al Otaiba, Saif Al Merri and Saif Al Sa'adi.
From Saudi Arabia, Sa'ad Aloosh will entertain the crowd with his enchanting lyrics. Others are Adonis from Syria, from Egypt Abdul Rahman Al Abnoudi. From South Africa, Breyten Breytenbach, James Fenton, UK and Joachim Sartorius, Germany among many others.
According to Saeed Saoud Al Abdouli, head of events committee, "shopping malls in Dubai will witness unprecedented ancient poetical activity that used to take place in the old times among Arab," he said, adding, "people used to gather and exchange, talk and challenge each others, using the language of poetry, and such phenomenon will be resurrected in Dubai, during the poetry festival."
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