Bashshar was of Persian ethnicity; his grandfather was taken as a captive to Iraq, but his father was a freedman (mawla) of the Uqayl tribe.
Bashshar fell foul of some religious figures, such as Malik ibn Dinar and al-Hasan al-Basri, who condemned his poetry for its licentiousness.
Being anti-Mu'tazili, he criticized Wasil ibn Ata, who by some accounts is considered the founder of the Mutazilite school of Islamic thought.
[9] Hugh Kennedy, on the other hand, relates al-Tabari's account that Ya'qub ibn Dawud had Bashshar murdered in the marshes between Basra and Baghdad.
[10] Most of his Hija' (satires) are in traditional style, while his fakhr expresses his Shu'ubi sentiments, vaunting the achievements of his Persian ancestors and denigrating the "uncivilized Arabs".