Ebrahim Al-Arrayedh (1908–2002, Arabic: إبراهيم العريّض) was one of the greatest poets of Bahrain.
Al-Arrayedh grew up in Bombay, India without speaking any Arabic, and it was only after his family moved back to their home in Bahrain when he was eighteen did he learn the language. His first poetry was published in Baghdad in 1931. A multi-linguist, he translated the works of poets between Persian, Hindi, Urdu, English, and Arabic. Today, he remains one of the most popular writers in Bahrain.
He was also a noted reformer setting up a school, and was appointed head of the Constitutional Council by the late Amir, Sheikh Isa Bin Salman Al-Khalifa, who was responsible for developing Bahrain's Constitution in the early 1970s prior to independence from the United Kingdom.
Al-Arrayedh died in March 2002 after breathing problems. He went to hospital but could not be saved so the 95 year old man died at the hospital. He was buried in the "Manama Graveyard" next to his daughter the late Layla Al-Arrayedh who died in 2001 just before her father died.
Following his death, the King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa, named one of the Kingdom’s most geographically important roads after him — opposite the Bahrain Financial Harbour. In 2006, his old house, in Gudaibiya, in the capital city of Manama, was turned into a cultural centre, the Ebrahim Al-Arrayedh Poetry House, open to tourists and as a meeting place for poets.
In 2008, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation held an exhibition in Al-Arrayedh's honour in its headquarters in Paris, France.[1]
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