Khalil Mutran خليل مطران | |
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| Born | (1872-07-01)July 1, 1872 Baalbek,Ottoman Syria(modern dayLebanon) |
| Died | June 1, 1949(1949-06-01) (aged 76) Cairo,Kingdom of Egypt |
| Occupation | Poet,Translator,Journalist |
| Nationality | Lebanese-Egyptian |
| Genre | Poetry,Translation |
| Literary movement | Neo-romanticism, Apollo Society |
| Notable works | Diwan-al-Khalil |
Khalil Mutran (Arabic:خليل مطران,ALA-LC:Khalīl Muṭrān; July 1, 1872 – June 1, 1949), also known by the sobriquetShā‘ir al-Quṭrayn (Arabic:شاعر القطرين,lit. 'the poet of the two countries') was aLebanese poet and journalist who lived most of his life inEgypt.
Khalil was born atBaalbek inOttoman Syria to Abdu Yusuf Mutran and Malaka Sabbag from Haifa.Nakhlé Moutran, pasha of Baalbek, was his cousin. Khalil's mother Malaka descended from a large Palestinian family. Malaka's father was among the most respected persons in Haifa and her grandfather was an advisor ofAhmed al-Jazzar, pasha ofSaint John d'Acre, who successfully resisted the siege of this town by the troops ofNapoleon Bonaparte.[1]
Khalil attended the Greek Catholic School in Beirut, where he was taught byNasif al-Yaziji's sons, Khalil andIbrahim.[2] It was here he had formally studied his native Arabic as well as French. In 1890, he left Lebanon for France. Although he planned to immigrate to Chile, he actually settled inEgypt in 1892. Here, he found his first job atAl-Ahram. He also contributed toAl-Mu’yyad andAl-Liwa. In 1900, he founded his own fortnightly magazine,Al-Majalla al-misriyya (1900-2, 1909). He published some of his own works and also ofMahmud Sami al-Barudi in this magazine. In 1903, he started publishing a daily newspaperAl-Jawaib al-misriyya (1903-5), which supportedMustafa Kamil’s nationalist movement. He collaborated withHafez Ibrahim in translating a French book on political economy. He translated a number of plays ofShakespeare,Corneille,Racine,Victor Hugo andPaul Bourget into Arabic. In 1912 he translatedShakespeare’s dramaOthello into Arabic asUtayl, which is the most celebrated and best-known translation of the drama into Arabic. His translation was not based on the original, but on a French version of it by Georges Duval. Other dramas of Shakespeare translated into Arabic by him areHamlet,Macbeth,The Merchant of Venice,The Tempest,Richard III,King Lear andJulius Caesar. He also translated Corneille’sLe Cid,Cinna andPolyeucte and Victor Hugo’sHernani. He later took a post as secretary to the Agricultural Syndicate and helped to foundBanque Misr in 1920. In 1924, he made a long journey through Syria and Palestine, after which he claimed himself as a poet of the Arab countries (Arabic:شاعر الأقطار العربية). After the death ofAhmed Shawqi in 1932, he chaired theApollo literary group till his death. In 1935, he became director of theAl-Firqa al-Qawmiyya (National Company) of the Egyptian theatre. He died inCairo in 1949.
An anthology of his poems, theDiwan-al-Khalil was published in four volumes during his lifetime, the first volume of which was published in 1908. In his poems,Hourani feels, “traditional forms and language were used not for their own sake but to give precise expression to a reality, whether in the external world or in the author’s feelings”. He was a pioneer of theRomantic poetry in the middle east,[3]
