Voice of Arabic Network
Search
Juan Valera
Image: Unknown author, Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

Juan Valera

خوان فاليرا

Notable figure 1824–1905 · Source: Najib al-Aqiqi, al-Mustashriqun, 3rd ed. (Cairo: Dar al-Maʿarif, 1964), vol. 2, p. 586; Yahya Murad, Muʿjam asmaʾ al-mustashriqin, p. 493 · Second source: Bibliothèque nationale de France, authority record: Valera, Juan (1824-1905), novelist and essayist

Field: Literature and poetry

Affiliation

Translator of Andalusian Arabic poetry into Spanish verse

Biography

Born in Cabra near Córdoba, he studied law in Granada and Madrid, served as a diplomat, and was one of the leading Spanish novelists and critics of his time. He translated Adolf Friedrich von Schack's Poesie und Kunst der Araber in Spanien und Sicilien into Spanish in three volumes, putting into Spanish verse the Andalusian poems, by al-Turtushi, al-Rundi, ʿAli ibn Saʿid and others, that Schack had rendered in German verse. The translation was printed in Madrid and again in Seville (1881).