Abu al-Qasim al-Shabi

Abu al-Qasim al-Shabi (1909–1934) was a Tunisian poet born at al-Shabiya in the Tozeur region on 24 February 1909, the son of a judge who had trained at the Zaytuna and al-Azhar.¹² He took his secondary diploma in 1928 and a law diploma from the University of Ez-Zitouna in 1930, married his cousin Chahla and had two sons, and wrote poetry that appeared in the leading Tunisian and Middle Eastern reviews.² Nicknamed the Poet of al-Khadra — "the Green", a name for Tunisia — he belonged to the Taht al-Sur circle of Tunis intellectuals who sought to build a national literary culture against colonialism.²¹

Al-Shabi suffered from heart disease from childhood and died in Tunis on 9 October 1934, aged twenty-five; he was buried at Tozeur, where his mausoleum is open to visitors.²³ His poems "The Will to Live", written in 1933, and "To the Tyrants of the World" became slogans chanted in the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions of 2011, and his verses close the Tunisian national anthem, "Humāt al-Ḥimā"; his portrait appears on the ten-dinar note.²