Abdo Wazen

was born in Beirut in 1957. He is a poet, and cultural editor of the international daily Al-Hayat newspaper. He published his first collection of poems in 1982 [The Locked Forest], and since then six others. Copies of his book, Hadiqat al-Hawas [Garden of Sensation] (1993) were seized by the Lebanese Ministry of Interior on accusations of licentiousness.

In 1997 his translation of Jacques Prevert: 50 Poems was published by Dar An-Nahar. He later translated and introduced Nadia Twueni: 20 poems for a Love. Diwan al-Hallaj, edited and introduced by Abdo Wazen, is highly regarded.

His memoir, (An Open Heart), was written after he underwent a major heart operation in 2010, and is excerpted in Banipal 40 – Libyan Fiction.