The book *Twenty Drawings* was first published in New York in 1916. In it, Alice Raphael compiled twenty of Gibran’s visual artworks, accompanying them with literary and philosophical commentaries that reflect her profound understanding of his symbolism and visual language. It was a work—the first of its kind—that introduced Gibran to Western readers as a painter and thinker, predating his subsequent renown as a world-class poet and literary figure.
In this new Arabic edition, translator Zahi Rustum presents a literary work featuring an elegant and precise rendering of Raphael’s texts. He reintroduces the volume to the Arabic reader within its original artistic and cultural context, thereby illuminating the deep-seated relationship between the images and the words—between Gibran, who painted the world as he saw it, and Raphael, who articulated it as she felt it.
This book stands as a celebration of Gibran—a window through which the Arabic-speaking world may gaze upon one of the most significant artistic and intellectual works to emerge prior to the advent of Gibran’s literary fame.
This edition recaptures the spirit of Beirut, Boston, and New York in the early decades of the last century—an era when culture served as a bridge, the written word was a painting, and the painting, a poem.