Damascus Bids Farewell to Prominent Syrian Novelist Hanna Mina
DAMASCUS, (ST)- Damascus on Thursday bade farewell to the prominent Syria novelist Hanna Mina who died yesterday at the age of 94 after long suffering with illness.
Official figures, intellectuals and artists paid last respect to the late novelist in Damascus before the funeral procession headed to his hometown in Lattakia where he will be laid to rest.
Culture Minister Ahmad al-Ahmad hailed the great works of Hanna Mina that reflected reality as well as his love to the sea.
The Ministry of Culture mourned the Late Mina being one of the greatest Arab writers and one of the novel figures, having written more than 40 novels throughout half a century, SANA said.
His novels basically tackled the topics of exploitation, greed and oppression of women. He predicted that the novel will occupy a great status in the Arab world.
Mina is a co-founder of the Arab Writers Union in Syria. “Blue Lamps”, “The Tempest” and “The End of a Brave Man” are some of his prominent novels.
According to Arab Writers wetbsite, Mina’s The Sail and the Storm is No. 14 on the “best 105 Arabic books list,” as voted by the Arab Writers Union. It is not available in English. But Mina’s Sun on a Cloudy Day was translated by Bassam K. Frangieh from lebanon. And Fragments of Memory: A Story of a Syrian Family was translated by Olive E. Kenny and Lorne Kenny and published by Interlink in 2004.
Hamda Mustafa