Shafaq News- Baghdad

Baghdad hosted literary discussions, poetry readings, and music on Friday to mark 100 years since the birth of Iraqi poets Badr Shakir Al-Sayyab, Abdul-Wahab Al-Bayati, and Buland Al-Haydari.

The “Centenary of the Pioneers” festival held two literary criticism sessions on Al-Mutanabbi Street, one examining Al-Haydari’s poetry and role in poetic renewal and another focusing on Al-Bayati’s work. The program continued with poetry readings and a musical performance at the Al-Mutasarrifiyya building in the street before concluding with a poetry evening at Al-Jawahiri Hall, headquarters of Iraq’s General Union of Writers and Authors.

The festival opened Thursday at Baghdad’s Al-Rashid Theater. Arif Al-Saadi, cultural adviser to the prime minister and head of the organizing committee, said the three poets brought their dreams and questions to Arabic poetry at a historic turning point.

Iraq’s Culture Ministry describes the three, all born in 1926, as leading figures whose work contributed to major changes in modern Iraqi and Arab poetry.