Fadwa Tuqan

Who is Fadwa Tuqan?

Fadwa Tuqan was born in Nablus in 1917 into a prominent Palestinian family. Confined largely to home schooling because of conservative family restrictions on girls, she later studied English literature at Oxford in the 1960s. She became one of the most prominent Arab women poets of the twentieth century, often called the "Poet of Palestine." Her early poetry explored personal and romantic themes, but after the 1967 war her work shifted toward national and political themes of occupation, exile, and resistance, written while she remained in Nablus under Israeli occupation for most of her life. Her 1985 autobiography, "A Mountainous Journey," candidly described her lifelong struggle against patriarchal constraints on women. Her poetry collections include "Alone with the Days" and "Before the Closed Door." She died in Nablus in 2003, and the Fadwa Tuqan Award for young Palestinian poets was later established in her honor.

Sources: Fadwa Tuqan, A Mountainous Journey: An Autobiography (trans. Olive Kenny, 1990) · Fadwa Tuqan, Selected Poems · Salma Khadra Jayyusi (ed.), Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature