The Arabic Bildungsroman: A Generic Appraisal

1993 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nedal M. Al-Mousa
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Arab World ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Similar Material ◽  
Historical Experience ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
Regional Approach

“Does the Arabic novel exist?” With this provocative question, Hilary Kilpatrick begins an article entitled “The Arabic Novel—A Single Tradition?,” in which she makes clear that her question has been inspired both by the established regional approach most critical studies use in dealing with the Arabic novel, and by the absence of a continuous tradition of the novel as a genre in the Arab world. But, while underscoring variety in form, style, and subject, Kilpatrick, keen to provide an answer to her question, concludes in unequivocal terms that the Arabic novel as a single tradition does certainly exist: “It is written in one language, and [has] a shared cultural heritage and recent historical experience common to the whole area [which] providef[s] novelists in different countries with similar material. In this respect the Arabic novel is distinct in its subject matter from the African or German novel, for instance.” Although the conclusion is valid, it is based on his- torical and cultural generalizations rather than on a thorough study of novels from the Arab world. Nor does the platitudinous remark with which the quotation con- cludes help Kilpatrick make her case in a particularly convincing manner. The distinct nature of the Arabic novel, as this study will demonstrate, is best exemplified in what might be called the Arabic Bildungsroman. Its definitive, culturally determined themes and structure, distinctive basic tension, and established literary conventions to my mind suggest the presence in the Arab world of at least this kind of novel.

scholarly journals ASPECTS OF NARRATIVE IN THE PROSE OF WRITER PETRO MARKO

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-4
Author(s):  
Antela Voulis
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Creative Work ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Social Equality ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
Prose Style ◽  
Poetic Expression ◽  
The Subject

Petro Marko is considered by critics as one of the founders of modern Albanian prose. Scientific assessments of Petro Markos’s creativity are mainly based on long and short prose, in the form of genuine critical studies, short predictions, comments and analysis. There are papers of this nature written by scholars such as: Floresha Dado, Adriatik Kallulli, Bashkim Kuçuku, Ali Aliu, Robert Elsie and many others. The subject matter of these articles varies from simple information to moments of writer’s life, to genuine studies and analysis regarding interpretation and explanation of different elements of the structure of his literary works. In this case, we would like to highlight an article written by the author Bashkim Kuçuku, namely the novel “A name on four streets”. In this particular paper, Kucuku discusses the symbolism of the novel’s title, that even in its metaphorical form didn’t escape the punishment of dictatorship censure, closely connected with the tragic fate that followed Petro Marko. And by doing so the researcher gives us a detailed insight of the connection between his work and a broader background of Marco’s biography. In this context, together with the detailed analysis of the novel’s title, we will find the key point that paves the way for penetrating the original metaphor and symbolism of the story. According to Kuçuku, Petro Marko is a dignified, idealist, as well a stoic writer for justice and social equality. It is precisely this book, “A name in four ways”, that distinctly portrays the aforementioned author as one of the leading writers of prose in Albania and this work is one of his most distinguished among all the others. It is the aim of this study to harmonize the internal narrative analysis of the prose style with the poetic expression of all Petro Mario’s creative work.

scholarly journals ASPECTS OF NARRATIVE IN THE PROSE OF WRITER PETRO MARKO

2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (6) ◽  
pp. 1761-1762
Author(s):  
Antela Voulis
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Creative Work ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Social Equality ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
Prose Style ◽  
Poetic Expression ◽  
The Subject

Petro Marko is considered by critics as one of the founders of modern Albanian prose. Scientific assessments of Petro Markos's creativity are mainly based on long and short prose, in the form of genuine critical studies, short predictions, comments and analyzes. There are papers of this nature written by scholars such as: Floresha Dado, Adriatik Kallulli, Bashkim Kuçuku, Ali Aliu, Robert Elsie and many others. The subject matter of these articles varies from simple information to moments of writer's life, to genuine studies and analysis regarding interpretation and explanation of different elements of the structure of his literary works. In this case, we would like to highlight an article written by the author Bashkim Kuçuku, namely the novel "A name on four streets". In this particular paper, Kucuku discusses the symbolism of the novel’s title, that even in its metaphorical form didn’t escape the punishment of dictatorship censure, closely connected with the tragic fate that followed Petro Marko. And by doing so the researcher gives us a detailed insight of the connection between his work and a broader background of Marco’s biography. In this context together with the detailed analysis of the novel’s title we will find the key point that paves the way for penetrating the original metaphor and symbolism of the story. According to Kuçuku, Petro Marko is a dignified, idealist, as well a stoic writer for justice and social equality. Is precisely this book, "A name in four ways", that definitely portrays the fore mentioned author as one of the leading writers of prose in Albania and this work one of the most distinguished among the others. It is the aim of this study to harmonize the internal narrative analysis to the prose style with poetic expression of all Petro Mario’s creative work.

Stranger Fictions

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca C. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Central Place ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Reading Practices ◽  
Global Circulation ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
History Of ◽  
Modern Arabic

Zaynab, first published in 1913, is widely cited as the first Arabic novel, yet the previous eight decades saw hundreds of novels translated into Arabic from English and French. This vast literary corpus influenced generations of Arab writers but has, until now, been considered a curious footnote in the genre's history. Incorporating these works into the history of the Arabic novel, this book offers a transformative new account of modern Arabic literature, world literature, and the novel. This book rewrites the history of the global circulation of the novel by moving Arabic literature from the margins of comparative literature to its center. Considering the wide range of nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century translation practices, the book argues that Arabic translators did far more than copy European works; they authored new versions of them, producing sophisticated theorizations of the genre. These translations and the reading practices they precipitated form the conceptual and practical foundations of Arab literary modernity, necessitating an overhaul of our notions of translation, cultural exchange, and the global. The book shows how translators theorized the Arab world not as Europe's periphery but as an alternative center in a globalized network. It affirms the central place of (mis)translation in both the history of the novel in Arabic and the novel as a transnational form itself.

A Thousand and One Nights and the Novel

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard van Leeuwen
Keyword(s):  
Magical Realism ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
Literary Genre ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The West ◽  
Eighteenth And Nineteenth Centuries ◽  
Modern Arabic

This chapter examines the influence of Alf layla wa layla (A Thousand and One Nights), the ingenious Arabic cycle of stories, on the development of the novel as a literary genre. It shows that the Nights helped shape the European novel in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The chapter first explains how the French translation of the Nights and its popularity in Europe led to its incorporation in world literature, creating an enduring taste for “Orientalism” in many forms. It then considers how the Nights became integrated in modern Arabic literature and how Arabic novels inspired by it were used to criticize social conditions, dictatorial authority, and the lack of freedom of expression. It also discusses the Nights as a source of innovation for the trend of magical realism, as well as its role in the interaction between the Arab world and the West.

scholarly journals Tradition Versus and Modernity in Laila al-Juhani’s The Waste Paradise: An Intertextual Approach

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 1197-1202
Author(s):  
Mohammed Abdullah Abduldaim Hizabr Alhusami
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Short Story ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Saudi Women ◽  
The Core ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Story Writer

The aim of this paper is to investigate the issue of intertextuality in the novel Alfirdaws Alyabab (The Waste Paradise) by the female Saudi novelist and short story writer Laila al-Juhani. Intertextuality is a rhetoric and literary technique defined as a textual reference deliberate or subtle to some other texts with a view of drawing more significance to the core text; and hence it is employed by an author to communicate and discuss ideas in a critical style. The narrative structure of Alfirdaws Alyabab (The Waste Paradise) showcases references of religious, literary, historical, and folkloric intertextuality. In analyzing these references, the study follows the intertextual approach. In her novel The Waste Paradise, Laila al-Juhani portrays the suffering of Saudi women who are less tormented by social marginalization than by an inner conflict between openness to Western culture and conformity to cultural heritage. Intertextuality relates to words, texts, or discourses among each other. Moreover, the intertextual relations are subject to reader’s response to the text. The relation of one text with other texts or contexts never reduces the prestige of writing. Therefore, this study, does not diminish the status of the writer or the text; rather, it is in itself a kind of literary creativity. Finally, this paper aims to introduce Saudi writers in general and the female writers in particular to the world literature.

scholarly journals قضايا موضوعية في "أم النذور" للروائي عبد الرحمن منيف: دراسة تحليلية نقدية / Topical issues in the novel “Umm Nuzur” by Abdurrahman Munif: An Analytical and Critical Study

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nor Safirah Binti Ahmad Sufian ◽  
Mohammed Ahmed Al Qudah
Keyword(s):  
Social Issues ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
Critical Study ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Artistic Creativity ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
Religious Issues ◽  
Critical Methods ◽  
Selection Of

ملخص البحث: تتطرّق هذه الدراسة إلى قضايا شتى في رواية "أم النذور" للكاتب عبد الرحمن منيف، وتهدف إلى إظهار إبداعية الكاتب في صياغتها في روايته. يعتمد الباحثان في هذه الدراسة على المناهج الآتية: الوصف والتحليل والنقد؛ إذ يقومان بعرض نبذة عن حياة الروائي في بداية الدراسة، ثم يقومان بالتحليل والنقد للقضايا المتوافرة في الرواية مع التنويه بمظاهر الإبداع الفني فيها. تحاول هذه الدراسة الإسهام في إثراء الدراسات النقدية في الأدبي العربي فضلاً عن توسيع المراجع المتعلقة بفن السيرة والتراجم. ومما توصّل إليه الباحثان من خلال هذه الدراسة أن رواية "أم النذور" تحمل في طياتها قضايا عديدة، وهي تنقسم إلى ثلاثة أقسام، أولها القضايا الاجتماعية، ومن أهمها الشعوذة وغيرها من أمور الغيبيات والمعتقدات الخرافية. وثانيها القضايا الإنسانية التي لها علاقة بشعور الإنسان وعاطفته، وثالثها القضايا الدينية التي ترتبط بالأبعاد الإسلامية، وفضلاً عن ذلك، وجدت الدراسة أن الكاتب وفّق في رسم الشخصيات، وانتقاء أسمائها، وبناء الأحداث في روايته، كما تبدو كذلك محاولته في تشويه سمعة الرجال المتديّنين.   الكلمات المفتاحية: رواية "أم النذور" – عبد الرحمن منيف – القضايا – الشعوذة – الجوانب الإسلامية.    Abstract: This study discusses various issues in the novel “Umm al-Nudhur” written by Abd al-Rahman Munif. It aims to highlight his creativy as formulated in his novel. The writers make use in the study descriptive, analytical and critical methods. The researchers present briefly an overview of the writer’s background at the beginning of the study and then analyze critically the various issues in the novel keeping in mind the artistic creativity of the novel. This study is expected to contribute to the existing critical studies of Arabic literature as well as to enrich the biographical references related to the art of biography wrting. In conclusion, the novel "Umm al-Nudzūr" is found to accommodate diverse issues which can be divided into three sections. First: social issues that encompass mystical belief such as witchcraft, sorcery and superstition. Second: human issues which are related to emotion and feeling of mankind. Third: religious issues that reflect the dimensions of Islam. This study also found the ability of Abd al-Rahman Munif to depict the characters through the selection of their name and building a successful plot. Apart from that, it could be seen indirectly that the writer attempts to defame the reputation of religious men in his novel.   Keywords: Novel “Umm al-Nudhur” – Abd al-Rahman Munif – Issues – Mystic Belief – Islamic Teaching.   Abstrak: Kajian ini membincangkan isu-isu yang dalam novel "Umm al-Nudhur" karya Abd al-Rahman Munif. Tujuan kajian ini dijalankan adalah untuk meninjau pemikiran Abd al-Rahman Munif, sekaligus menonjolkan cara penampilan kreativiti beliau dalam karya tersebut. Reka bentuk kajian ini adalah berdasarkan kepada metod deskriptif, analitikal dan kritis. Pengkaji mengemukakan biografi penulis secara ringkas pada permulaan kajian, disusuli dengan analisis dan kritikan terhadap isu-isu yang dipaparkan dalam novel yang dikaji di samping menekankan aspek kreativiti penulis dalam mengolah isu-isu berkenaan. Kajian ini diharap dapat memberi sumbangan terhadap bidang kritikan dalam kesusasteraan Arab selain dapat menambah rujukan tentang seni penulisan biografi. Hasil kajian menunjukkan bahawa novel “Umm al-Nudhur” mengandungi pelbagai isu dan persoalan yang boleh dikategorikan kepada tiga bahagian. Pertama: isu-isu kemasyarakatan melibatkan kepercayaan mistik seperti ilmu sihir, khurafat dan kepercayaan karut. Kedua: isu-isu kemanusiaan berkaitan emosi dan perasaan seseorang insan. Ketiga: isu-isu keagamaan yang memaparkan dimensi-dimensi ajaran Islam. Kajian ini juga dapat melihat kemampuan penulis dalam mempersembahkan jalan cerita secara baik, keupayaan beliau dalam menggambarkan setiap watak melalui pemilihan nama-nama sebilangan watak dan kejayaan beliau dalam menyusun plot yang berkesan. Selain itu, kajian juga mendapati bahawa Abd al-Rahman Munif cuba secara tidak langsung merendahkan reputasi golongan agamawan melalui novel tersebut.   Kata kunci: Novel “Umm al-Nudhur” – Abd al-Rahman Munif – Isu dan persoalan – Kepercayaan karut – Ajaran Islam.

scholarly journals Emotions vocabulary and the reconceptualisation of emotions in Ann Radcliffe’s “The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents”

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-58
Author(s):  
Elena D. Andonova-Kalapsazova
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Emotional Experience ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Emotional Experiences ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
Francis Hutcheson ◽  
History Of

The article undertakes the analysis of Ann Radcliffe’s novel The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents (1797) from a history of literary emotions perspective which, I argue, yields insights into the attitudes towards emotions embedded in Radcliffe’s works. A reading of the novel from such a perspective also complements the critical studies of the artist’s engaging with the eighteenth-century cult of sensibility. The novel is read as a text that registered but also participated in the dissemination of an epistemology of emotional experience articulated in the idiom of eighteenth-century moral philosophers – Francis Hutcheson, David Hume and Adam Smith - at the same time as it retained some of the older, theology-based conceptions of passions and affections. The dynamic in which the two frameworks for understanding the emotions exist in the novel is explored through a close reading of the vocabulary in which Radcliffe rendered the emotional experiences of her fictional characters. In this reading it is the passions which are found to have been invested with a variety of meanings and attributed a range of moral valences that most noticeably foreground the movement from a generally negative towards a more complex appreciation of powerful emotions.

The transformation of reality and the Arabic novel's aesthetic response

1994 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sabry Hafez
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Aesthetic Response ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
The Social ◽  
Rapid Pace ◽  
Modern Arabic

The rapid pace of the change sweeping through the Arab world over the last few decades has profoundly affected both its various cultural products and its writers' perception of their national identity, social role and the nature of literature. The aim of this paper1 is to discuss the major changes in the sociopolitical reality of the Arab world, the cultural frame of reference and the responses of one of the major literary genres in modern Arabic literature: the novel. It is assumed here that there is a vital interaction between the novel and its socio-cultural context, in that novels encode within their very structure various elements of the social reality in which they appear and within whose constraints they aspire to play a role. Their generation of meaning is enmeshed in a variety of cultural, psychological and social processes, and their reception therefore brings into operation an array of experiences necessary for the interpretive act.

Image embedded metadata in cultural heritage digital collections on the web

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 339-357 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emad Isa Saleh
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Cultural Resources ◽  
Digital Collections ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Metadata Record ◽  
Data Collection Process ◽  
Digital Collection ◽  
Image Metadata ◽  
The Web

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the availability of embedded metadata within images of digital cultural collections. It is designed to examine a proposed hypothesis that most digitally derived images of cultural resources are stripped of their metadata once they are placed on the web. Design/methodology/approach A sample of 603 images were selected randomly from four cultural portals which aggregate digitized cultural collections, then four steps in the data collection process took place to examine image metadata via the web-based tool and windows application. Findings The study revealed that 28.5 percent of the analyzed images contained metadata, no links exist between image embedded metadata and its metadata record or the pages of the websites analyzed, and there is a significant usage of Extensible Metadata Platform to encode embedded metadata within the images. Practical implications The findings of the study may encourage heritage digital collection providers to reconsider their metadata preservation practices and policies to enrich the content of embedded metadata. In addition, it will raise awareness about the potential and value of embedded metadata in enhancing the findability and exchange of digital collections. Originality/value This study is ground breaking in that it is one of the early studies, especially in the Arab world, which aim to recognize the use of image embedded metadata within cultural heritage digital collections on the web.

The Arabic Novel: New Roots, New Routes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Holt
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Nile Valley ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Arab Nationalism ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Nation States ◽  
Islamic Empire ◽  
1001 Nights ◽  
The 19Th Century

In the mid-19th century, the Arabic novel emerged as a genre in Ottoman Syria and khedival Egypt. While this emergence has often been narrated as a story of the rise of nation-states and the diffusion of the European novel, the genre’s history and ongoing topography cannot be recovered without indexing the importance of Arabic storytelling and Islamic empire, ethics, and aesthetics to its roots. As the Arabic periodicals of Beirut and the Nile Valley, and soon Tunis and Baghdad, serialized and debated the rise of the novel form from the 19th century onward, historical, romantic, and translated novels found an avid readership throughout the Arab world and its diaspora. Metaphors of the garden confronted the maritime span of European empire in the 19th-century rise of the novel form in Arabic, and the novel’s path would continue to oscillate between the local and the global. British, French, Spanish, and Italian empire and direct colonial rule left a lasting imprint on the landscape of the region, and so too the investment of Cold War powers in its pipelines, oil wells, and cultural battlefields. Whether embracing socialist realism or avant-garde experimentation, the Arabic novel serves as an ongoing register of the stories that can be told in cities, villages, and nations throughout the region—from the committed novels interrogating the years of anticolonial national struggles and Arab nationalism in the 1950s and 1960s, through the ongoing history of war, surveillance, exile, occupation, and resource extraction that dictates the subsequent terrain of narration. The Arabic novel bears, too, an indelible mark left by translators of Arabic tales—from 1001 Nights to Girls of Riyadh—on the stories the region’s novelists tell.

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