Hasan Shaheed Suhrawardy

Hasan Shahid Suhrawardy (; 24 October 1890 – 3 March 1965), also known as Shahid Suhrawardy, was a Bengali diplomat, translator, poet and art critic.

Career In 1914, Suhrawardy went on to Russia on a scholarship to further study the Russian language of which he already had a certain degree of mastery. He stayed on becoming Professor of English at Moscow University and was caught in the Russian Revolution (1917). He was an art-critic for The Statesman and was instrumental in bringing the work of Bengali painter Jamini Roy to the notice of the public.

Suhrawardy was a member of the Bengal Public Service Commission during 1943–46. Following the creation of Pakistan in 1947, he went to Karachi at the end of 1948. He was active as a member of the Federal Public Service Commission of Pakistan till 1952. He served as a guest lecturer of Oriental Art for two years at Columbia University commencing in 1952. At that time a new mansion for UNESCO was built in Paris and a selection committee was formed with international art-specialists to choose paintings that would decorate it in a befitting manner with artwork. Suhrawardy was a member of this committee.

Suhrawardy also worked as a diplomat. He was an ambassador of Pakistan to Spain, Morocco, Tunisia and the Vatican from 1954 onwards. He was very close to Jawaharlal Nehru and Sudhindranath Dutta. He was proficient in many languages including Russian, Cantonese, Aramaic, Greek, Italian, Spanish, French.

Suhrawardy retired in 1959 and returned to Pakistan and took no active part in public life.

Suhrawardy was the Founder President of Pakistan PEN, a sister organisation of the International Affiliation of Writers Guilds. His anthology titled Essays in Verse of his work was published in 1962 from Dhaka. It included the poems he had written during his stay at Oxford and works that he had published in different English and American literary journals. His poems embody the spirit of the different avant-garde poetic movements of Europe. The book itself is divided into three parts: New Poems, Early Poems and An Oldman's Songs, which reflect elegant and tender thoughts.