In my memory, the poet of the simple people Muhammad Taha Al-Gaddal…biography and journey
Sudan Events – Magda Hassan
Once again, on the anniversary of his passing, his loved ones set up condolences on their social media pages. The poet Muhammad Taha Al-Gaddal’s life extended from December 12, 1951 to August 4, 2021.
Al-Qadal is a contemporary Sudanese poet famous for writing colloquial lyric poetry, and his poetry has been sung by major Sudanese singers. Al-Gaddal began his poetic career at the end of the 1960s, but his star shone strongly at the beginning of the 1980s, when he emerged as a revolutionary poet whose poetry found great resonance in the Sudanese street at that time. He was one of the inspirations for the April 1985 uprising that overthrew President Jaafar al-Numeiri. He was also one of the inspirations for the December Revolution, which overthrew the rescue regime in April 2019.
Al-Qaddal was born in 1951, in the village of Halwa in the state of Gezira. He studied administration at the University of Khartoum, and worked at the beginning of his life for Sudan National Television. His star shone in the seventies and eighties and he was one of the most prominent poets of the popular uprising, which overthrew the rule of Jaafar Al-Nimeiry in 1985.
Muhammad Taha Al-Gaddal, who abandoned the study of medicine in order to devote himself to poetry, was known for his special vocabulary derived from the cultural and linguistic environment in which he grew up in the “Gezira” region in central Sudan, and the Egyptian poet Abdel-Rahman Al-Abnoudi classified him as one of the best Arab poets, a sumptuous journey of effort, giving, and great work. The deceased sincerely sided with the issues of the oppressed and the deprived, with his immortal poetry that shaped the conscience of the Sudanese, and his solid and steadfast positions towards major national issues. Muhammad Taha al-Gaddal was not just a poet throughout history. He was the author of a great poetic, humanitarian, and patriotic project, rich in beautiful meanings and values, and remained throughout history. His life sang songs of love, goodness, and beauty, and sang songs of freedom.
It was not known about the deceased who belonged to a specific party, but he was against dictatorships and totalitarian rule during the era of Numeiri and Omar al-Bashir, calling for freedoms, and concerned about his country and its issues. He translated this into poems published in collections, some of which were sung by singers who were characterized by political concern, such as the late Mustafa Sayed Ahmed and the Iqd al-Jallad band.
In this context, the artist and media personality Tariq Juwaili, a member of the Iqd Al-Jallad band, wrote: “He was an invincible support and support, dear and loyal.”
Since its inception in the mid-eighties, Al-Jallad has contributed greatly to its cohesion many times, and his relationship with all of its members was a relationship that exceeds the level of being described as family, and this affection and support remained until he left this world.