Khalil Gibran's Broken Wings is a poetic novel of tragic love, set in turn-of-the-century Beirut. Selma Karamy is betrothed to a prominent religious man's nephew but meets a young man and they fall in love. They begin to meet in secret, are discovered, and Selma is forbidden to leave her house. Broken Wings highlights the social issues of the time in the Eastern Mediterranean, including religious corruption, the rights of women and of wealth and happiness. Khalil Gibran was a Lebanese-American artist, poet, and writer. As a young man he emigrated with his family to the United States where he studied art and began his literary career. His Romantic style was at the heart of a renaissance in modern Arabic literature he is still celebrated as a literary hero.