Saif al-Rahbi
is a poet and prose writer, born in 1956 in Sroor, a village in Oman. He was sent to school in Cairo when a young boy, and there began his lifelong passion for literature and poetry.
He has lived and worked in Cairo, Damascus, Algeria, Paris for many years, London, and other Arab and European cities. His third poetry collection Ajras al-Qatia’a [The Bells of Rapture], published in 1985 when he was living in Paris, and marked him as "one of the most distinguished new poetic voices in the Gulf region".
Later, he returned to Oman and founded Nizwa, Oman's main quarterly cultural magazine and highly regarded throughout the Arab world. Today he is its editor-in-chief. He has published a number of volumes of poetry, prose and essays.
Contributor's Issues
Banipal No 4 Spring 1999
Banipal No 2 June 1998
Banipal No 23 Summer 2005
Banipal No 33 Autumn/Winter 2008
Latest News
06/02/2012At a celebration of literary translation on Monday 6 February at Kings Place, Khaled Mattawa will receive the 2011 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation.
[read more]03/02/2012
The Mosaic Rooms celebrates theartistic and poetic works of the great Syrian poet Adonis with talks and events from 3-8 February and an exhibition of Adonis's collages from 3 February until 30 March. The opening evening this Friday sees Adonis in conversation with Khaled Mattawa who is the winner of the 2011 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for his translation Adonis: Selected Poems.
[read more]16/01/2012
Khaled Mattawa wins the 2011 Saif Ghobash-Banipal Translation Prize for Adonis:Selected Poems
[read more]12/01/2012
Chair of IPAF Judges Georges Tarabichi announces the shortlist authors of the 2012 International Prize for Arabic Fiction.
[read more]09/01/2012
Banipal Book Club's first book for discussion is The Tobacco Keeper by Ali Bader.
[read more]08/01/2012
Ibrahim Aslan, one of Egypt's best-loved authors, has died of heart failure at the age of 77.
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