Lamia Abbas Amara

Lamia Abbas Amara (Arabic: لميعة عباس عمارة, also sometimes spelled Lamea Abbas Amara; 1929 – 18 June 2021) was an Iraqi poet. She was a pioneer of modern Arabic poetry and an important figure in contemporary poetry in Iraq.

Abbas died in the United States on 18 June 2021, aged 92.

She left Iraq in 1978 and lived most of her exile in San Diego, United States after emigrating during the time of Saddam Hussein. Her sister, Shafia Abbas Amara, also emigrated to San Diego.

She was a member of the administrative board of the Iraqi Writers Union in Baghdad between 1963 and 1975, a member of the administrative board of the Syriac Synod in Baghdad, and deputy permanent representative of Iraq to UNESCO in Paris between 1973 and 1975, and director of culture and arts at the University of Technology in Baghdad.

She studied at the Teachers' Training College, which later became part of the Baghdad University, and graduated in 1950.

She was born to a Mandaean family in Baghdad in 1929, and later grew up in Amarah. Her father was Bayan bar Manu. Her uncle Zahroun Amara (died 1929) was a famous silversmith, while her cousin Abdul Razzak Abdul Wahid (1930–2015) was also a poet.

Lamia Abbas owned several Mandaean manuscripts that were given to her by her maternal uncle, Dakhil Aidan. These manuscripts, including the Ginza Rabba (two copies dating to 1886 and 1935), Mandaean Book of John, and Book of the Zodiac, were studied by Jorunn Jacobsen Buckley. Buckley and Abbas were also lifelong friends.