Saadallah Wannous

Who was Saadallah Wannous?

Saadallah Wannous, Syrian playwright. He was born in the village of Hussein al-Bahr, near Tartous from the Alawites sect, where he received his early education. He studied journalism in Cairo, Egypt and later served as editor of the art and cultural sections of the Syrian paper Al-Baath and the Lebanese As-Safir. He also held for many years the directorship in the Music and Theater Administration of Syria. In the late Sixties, he traveled to Paris where he studied theater and encountered various currents, trends, and schools of European stage. His career as a playwright had begun in the early Sixties with several short plays which were characterized by a display of his fundamental theme: the relationship between the individual and society and its authorities.

In the late Sixties, triggered by the Arab defeat of the 1967 war with Israel, political Arabic theater was born. The defeat had resulted in the creation of a new level of awareness among artists and intellectuals, particularly toward the government-controlled press and its infiltration of popular culture. In 1969, joined by a group of playwrights, Wannous called for an Arab Festival for Theater Arts to be hosted in Damascus, later realized and attended by dramatists from all over the Arab world. In this festival, he introduced his new project: "theater of politicization," to replace the traditional "political theater." He intended theater to play a more positive role in the process of social and political change. His other powerful plays include Elephant, the King of All Times, The King is the King and Hanthala's Journey from Slumber to Consciousness.