Maram al-Massri was born in Latakia, Syria, in 1962, and has lived in France since 1982. She has nine published collections in Arabic or French, and her poems have been translated into many languages. Bloodaxe published her dual-language Arabic-English edition, A Red Cherry on a White-tiled Floor, with Khaled Mattawa's translation, in 2004, which was followed by publication in the US by Copper Canyon Editions in 2007. Barefoot Souls, a trilingual edition in Arabic, French and Theo Dorgan's English translation followed from Arc in 2015. Two subsequent collections written in French and translated by Theo Dorgan were published by Southword Editions in Cork, Liberty Walks Naked (2017) and The Abduction (2020), a Poetry Book Society Recommended Translation, with Hélène Cardona's translation of The Abduction following from White Pine Press in the US in 2023. She edited the anthology Love and War: Contemporary Kurdish Poets, translated by Alan Dent, published by Smokestack Books in 2024. She has travelled to many festivals around the world and has received many literary awards, including the Prix d’Automne de Poésie de la Société des Gens De Lettres, the Adonis Prize, the Premio Citta di Calopezzati, Il Fiore d’Argento, and the Dante Alighieri Prize.
