May Ziade

Early life

Ziade was born in Nazareth in Palestine to a Lebanese Maronite father (from Chahtoul village - Kesrouan, Lebanon) and a Palestinian mother. Her father, Elias Ziade, was editor of al-Mahrūsah.

Ziade attended primary school in Nazareth. As her father came to the Kesrouan region of Lebanon, at 14 years of age she was sent toAintoura to pursue her secondary studies at a French convent school for girls. Her studies in Aintoura had exposed her to French literature, and Romantic literature, to which she took a particular liking. She attended several Roman Catholic schools in Lebanon and in 1904, returned to Nazareth to be with her parents. She is reported to have published her first articles at age 16.

Journalism & Classical studies

In 1908, she and her family emigrated to Egypt. Her father founded "Al Mahroussah" newspaper while the family was in Egypt, to which Ziade contributed a number of articles.Ziade was particularly interested in learning languages, studying privately at home coupled with a French-Catholic education, and studying at local university for a Modern Languages degree while in Egypt. As a result, Ziade was completely bilingual in Arabic and French, and had working knowledge of English, Italian, German, Spanish, Latin as well as Modern Greek. She graduated in 1917.

Key Arab literary figure

Ziade was well known in Arab literary circles, receiving many male and female writers and intellectuals at a literary salon she established in 1912. Among those that frequented the salon were Taha Hussein, Khalil Moutrane, Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed, Antoun Gemayel, Walieddine Yakan, Abbas el-Akkad and Yacoub Sarrouf.

Though she had never married, from 1912 onward, she maintained an extensive written correspondence with Khalil Gibran. While they never met in person as he was living in New York City, the correspondence lasted 19 years until his death in 1931, and Ziade is credited with introducing his work to the Egyptian public.

Personal loss & depression

Between 1928 and 1931, Ziade suffered a series of personal losses, beginning with the death of her parents, her friends, and above all Khalil Gibran. She fell into a deep depression and returned to Lebanon where her relatives tried to place her in psychiatric hospital to gain control over her estate. Nawal El Saadawi submits that Ziade was sent to the hospital for expressing feminist sentiments. Ziade eventually recovered her lucidity and returned to Cairo where she died on October 17, 1941.