Dimasheq – News – Ahmad Al-Akala:
Syrian critic and academic Dr. Khaldoun Al-Shammaa is returning to Damascus for the first time in nearly fifty years of exile, in response to an invitation from Syrian Minister of Culture Mohammad Yassin Al-Saleh to participate in the Damascus International Festival of Arabic Poetry. The return carries profound cultural and human significance and has been welcomed by Syria’s cultural community as one of the most prominent moments of the festival’s inaugural edition.
Al-Shammaa’s return, following decades spent outside his homeland, is an emotional moment. He is regarded as one of the most prominent Syrian critics and academics in the field of modern Arabic literature. During his long years abroad, he made significant scholarly and critical contributions at a number of Arab and European universities, helping enrich Arabic literary and critical studies.
Participants in the festival told Dimasheq that Al-Shammaa’s presence goes beyond being an academic contribution to a poetry event. It also represents the return of a figure who left a clear mark on Syrian and Arab cultural life. They stressed that his return gives the festival a symbolic dimension, reflecting the openness of Syria’s cultural scene to its talents and expertise across the world.
Dr. Al-Shammaa is taking part in the festival’s sessions and intellectual seminars alongside a distinguished group of Syrian and Arab poets, critics, and researchers. The festival addresses issues related to poetry and literary criticism, as well as the transformations of contemporary Arabic poetry.
The Syrian Ministry of Culture is preparing to launch the first edition of the Damascus International Festival of Arabic Poetry, under the slogan “Poetry Begins in Damascus,” from August 2 to 7, 2026, at the Damascus Opera House. The festival brings together prominent poets from Syria and 14 Arab countries, including the Levant, the Gulf, the Maghreb and North Africa, Iraq, and Yemen. Its programme features evenings dedicated to both classical Arabic and Nabati poetry, as well as artistic activities including instrumental music, chanting, singing, and visual arts. It will also feature a book exhibition, critical lectures, and discussion panels addressing poetry, language, culture, and questions of creativity, in addition to tours of the old quarters of Damascus and visits to Maaloula, Saidnaya, and Daraa.
The event comes as part of renewed cultural activity following the fall of the Assad regime. The Ministry of Culture, represented by Minister Mohammad Yassin Al-Saleh, has invited a distinguished group of Syrian and Arab poets to announce the return of poetry to Damascus after liberation.
The Ministry of Culture’s invitation to Al-Shammaa is a symbolic step that brings the Damascene intellectual back to his homeland after decades of exile in London, as part of the festival’s celebration of critics and poets who contributed to the Arab literary movement away from ideological constraints.
Khaldoun Al-Shammaa is a Syrian literary critic born in Damascus in 1941. He graduated from Damascus University and later earned a PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies.
He is regarded as one of the leading figures in contemporary Arab literary criticism. His name became widely known in the Arab world from the 1970s through his renowned critical trilogy: “The Sun and the Phoenix: Studies in Method, Theory and Application,” “Criticism and Freedom,” and “Method and Terminology.” These works are considered among the key references in modern literary criticism and are distinguished by an advanced modernist perspective that rejected the ideological criticism prevalent at the time.
He became known in the cultural sphere as an independent critical voice advocating freedom of the literary text, away from political dictates. This position was among the main reasons for his clash with the cultural establishment under the one-party system of the Assad regime, prompting him to emigrate and settle in London in the late 1970s.
Since then, he has continued his critical work in exile and contributed to the establishment of literary and cultural journals. Among his notable works are “The Different and the Concordant: Representations of the Western Centre and the Arab Periphery and the Demonization of the Other,” “Modernism and Beyond: The Theory of Modernity – From Literary Criticism to Cultural Criticism” (in English), “Achilles’ Heel,” and “Letters of Odysseus,” in addition to his ongoing project on modern literary and critical methodologies among Arab scholars.
Throughout his writings and interviews, Al-Shammaa has repeatedly criticized the authoritarian structure and ideological influences that distorted Syrian cultural life, calling for a free form of criticism that avoids sectarianism and fallacies.
Al-Shammaa is returning to Damascus, his birthplace, at a time when Syria is witnessing a cultural opening aimed at restoring voices that had been silenced.
