Hanna Mina

Hanna Mina was born into an impoverished Greek Orthodox family in Latakia. Growing up in the squalor of refugee settlements in Iskenderun, he worked as a barber, dockside porter, sailor, and coal-trimmer before moving to Damascus to work as a journalist and militant labor unionist.

Mina is hailed as the supreme chronicler of the sea in Arab literature, publishing over forty novels that explored the titanic struggle of Syrian coastal fishermen, sailors, and impoverished workers against oppressive nature and colonial tyranny. Masterpieces like Al-Shira' wa-al-Asifa (The Sail and the Storm) and Al-Yater established him as an enduring titan of Arab social realism.