Mari Yanni Ata Allah

I recall my first meeting with her, in the company of my literary friend Salma Sayegh; one of the women's associations had delegated us to welcome her. We made a condition with ourselves that the visit should not exceed a quarter of an hour, since it was a visit of protocol more than of affection.

The meeting took place, and May poured forth her graceful talk and filled our minds and souls with her sweet meanings and her valuable discussions, so that before we knew it two hours had passed like flashing lightning, without protocol driving us to leave the hall and deprive ourselves of the most delightful of sittings with the most delightful of ladies. There followed gatherings and appearances on platforms with which she stirred the hearts of all, and they acknowledged her as mistress of the pen absolutely.

Then came that last confusion, which placed our great woman of letters on the two pans of a scale, between those who doubted her and those who wept for her; and I, in my far remoteness, was among those weeping over a mind being shaken, a soul being crushed, and powers collapsing under the weight of what I do not know, and none knows but God.

Then she made her last stand on the platform of the University, before a gathering holding their hearts in their hands, apprehensive at what confusion of meanings and words they might hear — and behold, she cast upon the people bewitching, captivating marvels of eloquence and expression such as could come only from a mind that had absorbed the sciences at their broadest and culture at its deepest.

One of those who attended that valuable lecture told me: When May appeared on the platform I felt an aversion at her form and appearance; but she had scarcely begun to speak when I imagined I was beholding the most beautiful of faces and hearing the sweetest of voices, and I felt the weight of a wondrous magic binding my senses. So I confessed with the confessors that May is the messenger of revelation and inspiration, the mistress of platforms and of eloquence, who holds sway over her hearers' feelings and dominates them by her eloquence and the magic of her expressions.

This is May, whose memory the magazine — The Woman's Voice — renews today, publishing about her and for her such words as carry us back to her life, which left behind, among the products of her penetrating mind and her vast learning, the greatest legacy for Arabic literature — a treasure for the generations to come; for she gave, alone, what all the women of the Arabs together have not given, and she pinned upon herself, by herself, the greatest of decorations — of glory, esteem, and immortality — one which has long filled our hearts and stirred our whole being.