Arabic literature
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Arabic literature (
Arabic literature emerged in the 5th century with only fragments of the written language appearing before then. The
History
Jahili
Days of the Arabs, tales in both meter and prose, contains the oldest extant Arabic narratives, focusing on battles and raids.[5]
Poetry
Notable poets of the pre-Islamic period were
Prose
As the literature of the Jahili period was transmitted orally and not written, prose represents little of what has been passed down.[4] The main forms were parables (المَثَل al-mathal), speeches (الخطابة al-khitāba), and stories (القِصَص al-qisas).[4]
Quss Bin Sā'ida was a notable Arab ruler, writer, and orator.[4] Aktham Bin Sayfi was also one of the most famous rulers of the Arabs, as well as one of their most renowned speech-givers.[4]
The Qur'an
The
Not only is the Qur'an the first work of any significant length written in the language, but it also has a far more complicated structure than the earlier literary works with its 114 , the 16th surah.
The 92
The word qur'an comes from the Arabic root qaraʼa (قرأ), meaning "he read" or "he recited"; in early times the text was transmitted orally. The various tablets and scraps on which its suras were written were compiled under Abu Bakr (573-634), and first transcribed in unified masahif, or copies of the Qur'an, under Uthman (576-656).[4]
Although it contains elements of both prose and poetry, and therefore is closest to or inimitability of the Qur'an which implies that nobody can copy the work's style.
Or do they say, “He has fabricated this ˹Quran˺!”? Say, ˹O Prophet,˺ “Produce ten fabricated sûrahs like it and seek help from whoever you can—other than Allah—if what you say is true!”
— 11:13
And if you are in doubt about what We have revealed to Our servant, then produce a sûrah like it and call your helpers other than
Allah, if what you say is true.
But if you do not - and you will never be able to - then fear the Fire, whose fuel is people and stones, prepared for the disbelievers.
— 2:23-24
Say, "If mankind and the jinn gathered in order to produce the like of this Qur’ān, they could not produce the like of it, even if they were to each other assistants."
— 17:88
This doctrine of i'jaz possibly had a slight limiting effect on Arabic literature; proscribing exactly what could be written. Whilst Islam allows Muslims to write, read and recite poetry, the Qur'an states in the 26th sura (Ash-Shu'ara or The Poets) that poetry which is blasphemous, obscene, praiseworthy of sinful acts, or attempts to challenge the Qu'ran's content and form, is forbidden for Muslims.
And as to the poets, those who go astray follow them
Do you not see that they wander about bewildered in every valley? And that they say that which they do not do
Except those who believe and do good works and remember Allah much and defend themselves after they are oppressed; and they who act unjustly shall know to what final place of turning they shall turn back.
— 26:224-227
This may have exerted dominance over the pre-Islamic poets of the 6th century whose popularity may have vied with the Qur'an amongst the people. There was a marked lack of significant poets until the 8th century. One notable exception was Hassan ibn Thabit who wrote poems in praise of Muhammad and was known as the "prophet's poet". Just as the Bible has held an important place in the literature of other languages, The Qur'an is important to Arabic. It is the source of many ideas, allusions and quotes and its moral message informs many works.
Aside from the Qur'an the
The other important genre of work in Qur'anic study is the
Rashidi
Under the
There was also poetry for entertainment often in the form of
Umayyad
The First Fitna, which created the Shia–Sunni split over the rightful caliph, had a great impact on Arabic literature.[4] Whereas Arabic literature—along with Arab society—was greatly centralized in the time of Muhammad and the Rashidun, it became fractured at the beginning of the period of the Umayyad Caliphate, as power struggles led to tribalism.[4] Arabic literature at this time reverted to its state in al-Jahiliyyah, with markets such as Kinasa near Kufa and Mirbad near Basra, where poetry in praise and admonishment of political parties and tribes was recited.[4] Poets and scholars found support and patronage under the Umayyads, but the literature of this period was limited in that it served the interests of parties and individuals, and as such was not a free art form.[4]
Notable writers of this political poetry include Al-Akhtal al-Taghlibi, Jarir ibn Atiyah, Al-Farazdaq, Al-Kumayt ibn Zayd al-Asadi, Tirimmah Bin Hakim, and Ubayd Allah ibn Qays ar-Ruqiyat.[4]
There were also poetic forms of
Abbasid
The Abbasid period is generally recognized as the beginning of the Islamic Golden Age, and was a time of significant literary production. The House of Wisdom in Baghdad hosted numerous scholars and writers such as Al-Jahiz and Omar Khayyam.[7][8] A number of stories in the One Thousand and One Nights feature the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid.[9] Al-Hariri of Basra was a notable literary figure of this period.
Some of the important poets in
Andalusi
The rise of Arabic literature in al-Andalus occurred in dialogue with the
Maghrebi
The Zaydani Library, the library of the Saadi Sultan Zidan Abu Maali, was stolen by Spanish privateers in the 16th century and kept at the El Escorial Monastery.[15]
Mamluk
During the
Ottoman
Significant poets of Arabic literature in the time of the Ottoman Empire included ash-Shab adh-Dharif, Al-Busiri author of "Al-Burda", Ibn al-Wardi, Safi al-Din al-Hilli, and Ibn Nubata.[4] Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulsi wrote on various topics including theology and travel.
Nahda
During the 19th century, a revival took place in Arabic literature, along with much of Arabic culture, and is referred to in Arabic as "
The translation of foreign literature was a major element of the Nahda period. An important translator of the 19th century was
This resurgence of new writing in Arabic was confined mainly to cities in
Just as in the 8th century, when a movement to translate
Poetry
During the
The next generation of poets, the so-called Romantic poets, began to absorb the impact of developments in Western poetry to a far greater extent, and felt constrained by Neoclassical traditions which the previous generation had tried to uphold. The Mahjari poets were emigrants who mostly wrote in the Americas, but were similarly beginning to experiment further with the possibilities of Arabic poetry. This experimentation continued in the Middle East throughout the first half of the 20th century.[23]
Prominent poets of the
Prose
Muhammad al-Kattani, founder of one of the first arabophone newspapers in Morocco, called At-Tā'ūn, and author of several poetry collections, was a leader of the Nahda in the Maghreb.[25][26]
Modern literature
Beginning in the late 19th century, the Arabic novel became one of the most important forms of expression in Arabic literature.[27] The rise of an efendiyya, an elite, secularist urban class with a Western education, gave way to new forms of literary expression: modern Arabic fiction.[19] This new bourgeois class of literati used theater from the 1850s, starting in Lebanon, and the private press from the 1860s and 1870s to spread its ideas, challenge traditionalists, and establish its position in a rapidly transforming society.[19]
The modern Arabic novel, particularly as a means of social critique and reform, has its roots in a deliberate departure from the traditionalist language and aesthetics of classical adab for "less embellished but more entertaining narratives."[19] This direction began with translations from French and English, followed by social romances by Salīm al-Bustānī and other writers—particularly Christians.[19] Khalil al-Khuri's narrative Way, Idhan Lastu bi-Ifranjī! (1859-1860) was an early example.[19]
The emotionalism of early 20th century writers such as Mustafa Lutfi al-Manfaluti and Kahlil Gibran, who wrote with heavy moralism and sentimentality, equated the novel as a literary form with imported Western ideas and "shallow sentimentalism."[19] Writers such as Muhammad Taimur of Al-Madrasa al-Ḥadītha "the Modern School," calling for an adab qawmī "national literature," largely avoided the novel and experimented with short stories instead.[19][28] Mohammed Hussein Heikal's 1913 novel Zaynab was a compromise, as it included heavy sentimentality but portrayed local personality and characters.[19]
Throughout the 20th century, Arabic writers in poetry, prose and theatre plays have reflected the changing political and social climate of the Arab world. Anti-colonial themes were prominent early in the 20th century, with writers continuing to explore the region's relationship with the West. Internal political upheaval has also been a challenge, with writers suffering censorship or persecution.
The interwar period featured writers such as Taha Hussein, author of Al-Ayyām, Ibrahim al-Mazini, Abbas Mahmoud al-Aqqad, and Tawfiq al-Hakim.[19] The acceptance of suffering in al-Hakim's 1934 Awdat ar-rūḥ , is exemplary of the disappointment that prevailed over the idealism of the new middle class.[19] As a result of increasing industrialization and urbanization, binary struggles such as the "materialism of the West" against the "spiritualism of the East," "progressive individuals and a backward, ignorant society," and "a city-versus-countryside divide" were common themes in the literature of this period and since.[19]
There are many contemporary Arabic writers, such as
Poetry
Mention no longer the driver on his night journey and the wide striding camels, and give up talk of morning dew and ruins.
I no longer have any taste for love songs on dwellings which already went down in seas of [too many] odes.
So, too, the ghada, whose fire, fanned by the sighs of those enamored of it, cries out to the poets: "Alas for my burning!"
If a steamer leaves with my friends on sea or land, why should I direct my complaints to the camels?
—Excerpt from Francis Marrash's Mashhad al-ahwal (1870), translated by Shmuel Moreh.[22]
After
An example of modern poetry in classical Arabic style with themes of
Poetry retains a very important status in the Arab world. Mahmoud Darwish was regarded as the Palestinian national poet, and his funeral was attended by thousands of mourners. Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani addressed less political themes, but was regarded as a cultural icon, and his poems provide the lyrics for many popular songs.
Novels
Two distinct trends can be found in the nahda period of revival. The first was a neo-classical movement which sought to rediscover the literary traditions of the past, and was influenced by traditional literary genres—such as the maqama—and works like One Thousand and One Nights. In contrast, a modernist movement began by translating Western modernist works—primarily novels—into Arabic.
In the 19th century, individual authors in
Almost each of the above [works] have been claimed as the first Arabic novel, which goes to suggest that the Arabic novel emerged from several rehearsals and multiple beginnings rather than from one single origin. Given that the very Arabic word "riwaya", which is now used exclusively in reference to the "novel", has traditionally conjured up a tangle of narrative genres [...], it might not be unfair to contend that the Arabic novel owes its early formation not only to the appropriation of the novel genre from Europe [...] but also, and more importantly, to the revival and transformation of traditional narrative genres in the wake of Napoleon's 1798 expedition into Egypt and the Arab world's firsthand encounter with industrialized imperial Europe.[30]
A common theme in the modern Arabic novel is the study of family life with obvious resonances of the wider family of the Arabic world.[
Plays
The musical plays of Lebanese
Classical Arabic literature
Poetry
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A large proportion of Arabic literature before the 20th century is in the form of poetry, and even prose from this period is either filled with snippets of poetry or is in the form of saj' or rhymed prose. The themes of the poetry range from high-flown hymns of praise to bitter personal attacks and from religious and mystical ideas to poems on women and wine. An important feature of the poetry which would be applied to all of the literature was the idea that it must be pleasing to the ear. The poetry and much of the prose was written with the design that it would be spoken aloud and great care was taken to make all writing as mellifluous as possible.
Religious scholarship
The research into the life and times of
Some of the earliest works studying the Arabic language were started in the name of Islam. Tradition has it that the caliph
Other caliphs followed after
The institutions set up mainly to investigate more fully the Islamic religion were invaluable in studying many other subjects. Caliph
Culinary
More medieval cookbooks have survived into the present day written in Arabic than in any other language. Classical Arabic culinary literature is comprised not only of cookbooks, there are also many works of scholarship, and descriptions of contemporary foods can be found in fictional and legendary tales like
Early authors appear to have been familiar with the earlier works of
Non-fiction literature
Compilations and manuals
In the late 9th century
One of the most common forms of literature during the
A type of work closely allied to the collection was the manual in which writers like ibn Qutaybah offered instruction in subjects like etiquette, how to rule, how to be a bureaucrat and even how to write. Ibn Qutaybah also wrote one of the earliest histories of the Arabs, drawing together biblical stories, Arabic folk tales and more historical events.
The subject of sex was frequently investigated in Arabic literature. The
Biography, history, and geography
Aside from the early
Some writers concentrated solely on history like
Diaries
In the medieval Near East, Arabic diaries were first being written from before the 10th century, though the medieval diary which most resembles the modern diary was that of Abu Ali ibn al-Banna in the 11th century. His diary was the earliest to be arranged in order of date (ta'rikh in Arabic), very much like modern diaries.[36]
Literary theory and criticism
Literary criticism in Arabic literature often focused on religious texts, and the several long religious traditions of hermeneutics and textual exegesis have had a profound influence on the study of secular texts. This was particularly the case for the literary traditions of Islamic literature.
Literary criticism was also employed in other forms of medieval
Fiction literature
In the
Epic literature
The most famous example of Arabic fiction is the
The One Thousand and One Nights is usually placed in the genre of
or propagation of the faith, humorous tales, moral tales, tales about the wily con-man Ali Zaybaq, and tales about the prankster Juha.Maqama
Love literature
A famous example of
The 10th-century Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity features a fictional anecdote of a "prince who strays from his palace during his wedding feast and, drunk, spends the night in a cemetery, confusing a corpse with his bride. The story is used as a gnostic parable of the soul's pre-existence and return from its terrestrial sojourn".[40]
Another medieval Arabic love story was Hadith Bayad wa Riyad (The Story of Bayad and Riyad), a 13th-century Arabic love story. The main characters of the tale are Bayad, a merchant's son and a foreigner from Damascus, and Riyad, a well-educated girl in the court of an unnamed Hajib (vizier or minister) of 'Iraq which is referred to as the lady. The Hadith Bayad wa Riyad manuscript is believed to be the only illustrated manuscript known to have survived from more than eight centuries of Muslim and Arab presence in Spain.
Many of the tales in the One Thousand and One Nights are also love stories or involve romantic love as a central theme. This includes the frame story of Scheherazade herself, and many of the stories she narrates, including "Aladdin", "The Ebony Horse", "The Three Apples", "Tale of Tàj al-Mulúk and the Princess Dunyà: The Lover and the Loved", "Adi bin Zayd and the Princess Hind", "Di'ibil al-Khuza'i With the Lady and Muslim bin al-Walid", "The Three Unfortunate Lovers", and others.
Several elements of
Murder mystery
The earliest known example of a whodunit murder mystery was "The Three Apples", one of the tales narrated by Scheherazade in the One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights). In this tale, a fisherman discovers a heavy locked chest along the Tigris river and he sells it to the Abbasid Caliph, Harun al-Rashid, who then has the chest broken open only to find inside it the dead body of a young woman who was cut into pieces. Harun orders his vizier, Ja'far ibn Yahya, to solve the crime and find the murderer within three days, or be executed if he fails his assignment.[42] Suspense is generated through multiple plot twists that occur as the story progresses.[43] This may thus be considered an archetype for detective fiction.[44]
Satire and comedy
In
In the 10th century, the writer
The terms "
Theatre
While
The most popular forms of theater in the medieval Islamic world were puppet theatre (which included hand puppets,
The
Philosophical novels
The Arab
Ibn al-Nafis described his book Theologus Autodidactus as a defense of "the system of Islam and the Muslims' doctrines on the missions of Prophets, the religious laws, the resurrection of the body, and the transitoriness of the world." He presents rational arguments for bodily
A
Science fiction
Al-Risalah al-Kamiliyyah fil Sira al-Nabawiyyah (The Treatise of Kamil on the Prophet's Biography), known in
A number of
Other examples of early Arabic proto-science fiction include
Arabic literature for young readers and children
As in other languages, there is a growing number of literary works written in Arabic for
In her 2011 essay "Arabic Children's Literature Today: Determining Factors and Tendencies" author and translator from Arabic to German Petra Dünges gave an overview of fiction written for Arab children since its beginnings in Egypt during the late 19th century, focussing on books published between 1990 and 2010. Judging from several modern illustrated books and mangas such as Gold Ring (الذهب سوار) by Emirati writer Qays Sidqiyy (Sheikh Zayed Book Award 2010), she noted an increase in the variety of children’s literature in the changing modern Arab society. Further, she noticed a growing demand for stories and adequate illustrations that take children as readers seriously. Finally, she ascertained that Arabic children’s literature is an important contribution the development of Arab society, crucial to keeping Arab culture and the Arabic language alive.[72][73]
Marcia Lynx Qualey, editor-in-chief of ArabLit online magazine, has translated Arabic novels for young readers, such as Thunderbirds by Palestinian writer Sonia Nimr.[74] Further, she has written on Arabic books for teens[75] and participated in academic forums.[76] She and other literary translators and consultants publish the website ArabKidLitNow!, promoting translated Arabic literature for children and young readers.[77]
Women in Arabic literature
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In the words of Clarissa Burt,
- Despite the historical and social conditions that contributed to an almost total eclipse of women's poetic expression in the literary record as maintained in Arabic culture from the pre-Islamic era through the nineteenth century, with a few significant exceptions, women poets writing in Arabic have made tremendous strides since the dawn of the twentieth century in presenting their poetic offerings in mainstream cultural forums, and contributing to a plethora of new and modern poetic currents in literary cultural throughout the Arab world.[78]
Whilst not playing a major attested part in Arabic literature for much of its history, women have had a continuing role. Women's literature in Arabic has been relatively little researched, and features relatively little in most Arabic-language education systems, meaning that its prominence and importance is probably generally underrated.[79]
The Medieval Period
In the estimation of Tahera Qutbuddin,
- the citation of women's poetry in the general medieval anthologies is sparse. The earliest anthologists either ignored women poets or made disparaging remarks about them ... In his introduction to the Nuzhat al-Julasa, al-Suyuti refers to a large (at least six-volume) anthology--now lost--of 'ancient' women's poetry ... It would seem from this that women poets may have formed a more dynamic part of the poetic landscape, at least in the earliest classical period, than is generally believed.[80]
(The main modern anthology of medieval Arabic women's writing in English translation is that of Abdullah al-Udhari.)[81]
Pre-Islamic women's literature seems to have been limited to the genre of marathiya ('elegy').
Writings from medieval moorish Spain attest to several important female writers, pre-eminently
Despite their lack of prominence among the literary elite, women still played an important part as characters in Arabic literature. Sirat al-amirah Dhat al-Himmah, for example, is an Arabic epic with a female warrior, Fatima Dhat al-Himma, as protagonist,[85] and Scheherazade is famous for cunningly telling stories in the One Thousand and One Nights to save her life.
The Mamluk period saw the flourishing of the Sufi master and poet 'A'isha al-Ba'uniyya (d. 1517), who was probably the Arabic-speaking world's most prolific female author before the twentieth century. Living in what is now Egypt and Syria, she came from the al-Ba'uni family, noted for its judges and scholars, and belonged to the 'Urmawi branch of the Qadiriyya order. 'A'isha composed at least twelve books in prose and verse, which included over three hundred long mystical and religious poems.[83]
Al-Nahda
The earliest prominent female writer of the modern period during which the Arab cultural renaissance (
Late 20th century to early 21st century
A quote by Clarissa Burt on modern Arabic poetry by female Arab authors:
Unlocked from the constraints of the traditional ode, several of these and other women have had long careers of poetry writing, entering into areas of expression of women's experience that had not been presented in print before. In many ways, this poetic work has gone hand in hand with the growth of critical discourse about women's role, status, and experience, and women's desires to be fully participating members of public society. [...] With few exceptions, critical reception in the Arab world of these and other women poets has been lukewarm at best, for the most part, often filled with criticism of their adherence or lack thereof to poetic principles that have been held as prescriptive in many schools of Arabic literary criticism.
Anbara Salam Khalidy (modern Palestine/Lebanon, 1897–1986) and Salma al-Malaika(Iraq, 1908–1953, under the pseudonym Umm Nizar).Since the Second World War, Arabic women's poetry has become markedly more prominent.
Salma al-Kadhimiyya, who in her own right was a poet and a vanguard of the early nationalist movement. Al-Malaika, alongside Badr Shakir al-Sayyab, can be considered the initiator of the Free Verse Movement in Arabic poetry. Al-Malaika's poetry is characterised by thematic variations and the use of imagery. She also wrote The Case of Contemporary Poets which is considered a major contribution to Arab literary criticism.[88]Other major post-war poetic voices include
Lami'a 'Abbas 'Amara(Iraq, b. 1927).The poetry of
Saniya Salih (Syria, 1935–85) appeared in many well-known magazines of her time, particularly Shi’r and Mawaqif, but remained in the shadow of work by her husband, the poet Muhammad al-Maghout. Her later poems often address her relationship with her two daughters, and many were written during her illness, as she died of cancer.[89]Other Arab post-war poetesses include
Su'ad al-Sabah (Kuwait, b.1942) and Hamda Khamis(Bahrain, b. 1946), who is regarded as Bahrain's first female free-verse poet.More recent Arabic literature has seen a growing number of female writers' works published:
Nawal el-Saadawi and Fatema Mernissi.[90]Women writers in the Arab world have unavoidably courted controversy. Layla Ba'albakki, for instance, was charged with obscenity and "endangering public morality" a few months after she published her collection of short stories titled Tenderness to the Moon (1963). The Lebanese vice squad actually traveled to every bookstore, where the book was sold, to confiscate all remaining copies because of its erotic content.[citation needed]
In Algeria, women's oral literature used in ceremonies called Būqālah, also meaning ceramic pitcher, became a symbol of national identity and anti-colonialism during the War of Independence in the 1950s and early 60s. These poems are usually four to ten lines in Algerian Arabic, and cover topics ranging from everyday life, like love and work, to the political, like the struggle for independence. Since using Algerian Arabic as poetic language was considered an act of cultural resistance in itself at the time, these poems took on a revolutionary implication.[91]
Contemporary Arabic literature
Suffice to say although female Arab authors still risk controversy by discussing explicit themes or taboo topic in their works, it is a theme explored more explicitly and with more vigour due to greater outreach thanks to social media and more international awareness of Arab literature. More current Arab female writers include Hanan al-Shaykh, Salwa al-Neimi (writer, poet and journalist), Joumanna Haddad (journalist and poet), Assia Djebar. Ahdaf Soueif and Yasmine El-Rashidi amongst others who confront less-talked about topics such as sex, prostitution, homosexuality and political censorship and prosecution within the Arab diaspora and also internationally in relation to Arab emigration.
Contemporary female Arab writers/poets/journalists alongside producing literature and non-fiction works often take on an activist role in their careers in order to highlight and improve the female condition in Arab society. This concept is embodied in female figures such as Mona Eltahawy, who is an Egyptian columnist and international public speaker. She is best known for her unconventional comments on Arab and Muslim issues and her involvement in global feminism. In 2015, she released her book Headscarves and Hymens in which she argues the need for a sexual revolution in the Middle East.[92] Another writer from Egypt is Basma Abdel Aziz, who has published dystopian novels called The Queue or Here is a Body, as well as nonfiction based on her studies of oppression, torture and authoritarian language of the government in Egypt.[93]
Contemporary Arab women's literature has been strongly influenced by the diaspora of Arabic-speakers, who have produced writing not only in Arabic, but also in other languages, prominently English, French, Dutch and German. The Internet is also important in furthering the reach of literature produced in Arabic or Arabic-speaking regions:
It is among the younger generation of poets that the Internet has become a platform for mounting collections and sharing poetry. Some of these poets have their own websites, while others are included on ever growing web anthologies being posted by young Arab computer geeks dedicated to the construction of web archives for Arabic poetry and poetic history. Similarly, critical treatment of these women's poetry, while now well established in on-line resources and web-based sites for major paper publications throughout the arab world, has yet to produce clearly defined critical means of articulating emerging values for poetry, for measuring the critical worth of some of these new productions, and for encouraging the production of Arab women's poetry which will have weight, depth, and acclaim comparable to the work of some of the major Arab male poets of our day.[94]
Literary criticism
For multiple centuries, there has been a vibrant culture of literary criticism in the Arabic speaking world. The poetry festivals of the pre-Islamic period often pitched two poets against each other in a war of verse, in which one would be decided to be winner by the audience. Literary criticism also relates to theology, and gained official status with Islamic studíes of the Qur'an. Although nothing which might be termed 'literary criticism' in the modern sense, was applied to a work held to be i'jaz or inimitable and divinely inspired, textual analysis, called ijtihad and referring to independent reasoning, was permitted. This study allowed for a better understanding of the message and facilitated interpretation for practical use, all of which helped the development of a critical method important for later work on other literature. A clear distinction regularly drawn between works in literary language and popular works has meant that only part of the literature in Arabic was usually considered worthy of study and criticism.
Some of the first Arabic
Qudamah ibn Ja'far. Other works continued the tradition of contrasting two poets in order to determine which one best follows the rule of classical poetic structure. Plagiarism also became a significant topic, exercising the critics' concerns. The works of al-Mutanabbi were particularly studied with this concern. He was considered by many the greatest of all Arab poets, but his own arrogant self-regard for his abilities did not endear him to other writers and they looked for a source for his verse.[96] Just as there were collections of facts written about many different subjects, numerous collections detailing every possible rhetorical figureused in literature emerged, as well as how to write guides.Modern criticism first compared new works unfavourably with the classical ideals of the past, but these standards were soon rejected as too artificial. The adoption of the forms of European
Taha Hussayn, himself well versed in European thought, would even dare to examine the Qur'an with modern critical analysis, in which he pointed out ideas and stories borrowed from pre-Islamic poetry.An outstanding Sudanese
Abdallah al-Tayyib (1921–2003). Arguably his most notable work is A Guide to Understanding Arabic Poetry, written over thirty-five years and published in four volumes of several thousand pages.[97]Outside views of Arabic literature
In al-Andalus, Arabic literary culture had a massive impact on Jewish literary culture in the tenth to thirteenth centuries; this included the assimilation of features, genres, and stylistic devices of Arabic poetry as well as—influenced by the classicizing Quranic language of classical Arabic poetry—the decision to write poetry in Hebrew and in a register rooted in Biblical Hebrew.[98]
Literature in Arabic has been influential outside the
Qur'an in the twelfth century, but it would not be until the early eighteenth century that much of the diverse Arabic literature would be recognised in the West. This was mostly due to Arabists, like Forster Fitzgerald Arbuthnotand his books such as Arabic Authors: A Manual of Arabian History and Literature.Thousand and One Nights was the first major work in Arabic which found great success outside the Muslim world. Other significant translators were Friedrich Rückert and Richard Burton, along with others working at Fort William, India. Since at least the 19th century, Arabic and many works in other Western Asian languages fuelled a fascination in Orientalist thinking and artistic production in the West. Works of dubious 'foreign' morals were particularly popular, but even these were censored for content, such as homosexual references, which were not permitted in Victorian society. Most of the works chosen for translation helped confirm the stereotypes of the audiences.[citation needed] Compared to the variety and scope of literature written in Arabic, relatively few historical or modern Arabic works have been translated into other languages.Since the mid-20th century, there has been an increase of translations of Arabic books into other languages, and Arabic authors began to receive a certain amount of acclaim. Egyptian writer
Nobel Prize for Literature. Other writers, including Abdul Rahman Munif and Tayeb Salih have found critical acclaim by Western scholars, and both Alaa Al Aswany's The Yacoubian Building and Rajaa al-Sanea's Girls of Riyadhattracted significant Western media attention in the first decade of the 21st century.See also
References
Citations
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- ^ Jones, p. ix.
- ^ Allen 2005.
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- ^ Jones, Alan (1 December 2007), "Ayyām al-ʿArab", Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE, Brill, retrieved 19 February 2024
- ^ "الوثائقية تفتح ملف "اللغة العربية"". الجزيرة الوثائقية (in Arabic). 8 September 2019. Archived from the original on 16 June 2022. Retrieved 18 June 2020.
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ISBN 978-0-521-33197-5.- Jones, Alan (2003). "Foreword". In Rodwell, J. M. The Koran. Phoenix.
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ISBN 0-521-32763-6.Further reading
- Abdel-Malek, Kamal, "Popular Arabic Religious Narratives", in Muhammad in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia of the Prophet of God (2 vols.), Edited by C. Fitzpatrick and A. Walker. Santa Barbara, Ca: ABC-Clio, 2014, Vol 2, pp. 460–465.
- Badawi, Muhammad Mustafa (1993). A Short History of Modern Arabic Literature. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
- Cachia, Pierre (2002). Arabic literature: an overview. London: RoutledgeCurzon.
OCLC 252908467.- Eglash, Ruth. "Arabic manuscripts from J'lem libraries to go online" Arabic manuscripts from J'lem libraries to go online
- Goeje, Michael Jan de; Thatcher, Griffithes Wheeler (1911). . In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 2 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 271–276.
- Johnson-Davies, Denys (ed.) 2006, The Anchor book of modern Arabic fiction, New York: Anchor Books.
- Kaaki, Lisa (2019). A history of Arab women in literature.
- Meisami, Julie Scott;
ISBN 0-415-18571-8.- Meisami, Julie Scott;
ISBN 0-415-18572-6.External links
New International Encyclopedia article about "Arabic literature".
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