scholarly journals Race and Racism in Historical Fiction: The Case of Jurji Zaydan’s Novels

Humanities ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 119
Author(s):  
Esra Tasdelen
Keyword(s):  
Historical Fiction ◽  
The Self ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Race And Racism ◽  
Islamic History ◽  
Arab Nationalism

This paper analyzes the conceptualization of ideas of race in three historical novels in the fictional work of Jurji Zaydan (1861–1914), a Syrian Christian intellectual who wrote on the Golden Ages of Islamic History through serialized, popular works of historical fiction. In the novels analyzed, Fath al-Andalus (Conquest of Andalusia), Abbasa Ukht al-Rashid (The Caliph’s Sister), and al-Amin wa al-Ma’mun (The Caliph’s Heirs), Zaydan depicts hierarchies of race that are delineated by certain features and categories, especially within the Abbasid among household slaves, and also centers the conflict within the novels around issues of differences in race and lineage. Zaydān shows the importance of rifts in Islamic history stemming from categorizations and distinctions between Arab and non-Arab, or Arab and Persian, or mawāli. The novels also reflect the self-conceptualization of Egyptians in relation to their perceptions of the Sudanese, at a time of the rise of Arab nationalism, in late 19th and early 20th centuries.

PETA KAJIAN ATAS NOVEL SEJARAH ISLAM KARYA JURJĪ ZAIDĀN

Jurnal CMES ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 4
Author(s):  
Moh. Wakhid Hidayat, Sangidu, Fadlil Munawwar Manshur, Taufiq Ahmad Dardiri
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
Arabic Literature ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Islamic History ◽  
Arab Nationalism ◽  
The Public ◽  
Novel Studies ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
Modern Arabic

The novel of Islamic history by Jurjī Zaidān is one of the works of Modern Arabic literature which appeared at the end of the 19th century. Since it was first published, as a serial story in al-Hilal magazine, this novel has been read and has received a great response. Zaidān composed 22 titles of novels from 1891 to 1914. After Zaidān's death in 1914, his novels were still read by the public, reprinted, and even translated in various languages in the world. Zaidān’s Islamic historical novels still exist, both within the scope of modern Arabic literature and in Arabic thought, with many studies to date. Research on this novel is reviewed and analyzed to reveal the diversity of perspectives to be mapped. Found nine perspectives in the study of Islamic historical novels; the perspective of the development of Arabic novel genres, the perspective of authorship and pioneering in Arabic novel genre, the perspective of the popularization of Arab-Islamic history, critical perspectives of Islamic historical facts, intrinsic literary criticism perspective, narrative structure perspective, feminist perspective, perspective modern Arab identity, and Arab nationalism perspective. The mapping of studies become the positioning of further Islamic historical novel studies, and at the same time can be a model of study for the analysis of other historical novels that develop in Arabic literature or other national literature.

Governance in Classical Islamic Thought

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ovamir Anjum
Keyword(s):  
Formative Period ◽  
The Self ◽  
Rapid Expansion ◽  
Land Grants ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Persian Empire ◽  
Islamic History ◽  
Islamic Thought ◽  
Islamic Society

Governance in Islamic history has taken many different forms. The formative period saw most innovative deployment of the Arab tribal norms under the guidance of Islamic norms and the pressure of the rapid expansion. After the conquests, the ruling elite augmented their Arab tribal form of governance with numerous institutions and practices from the surrounding empires, particularly the Persian empire. The Umayyads ruled as Arab chiefs, whereas the Abbasids ruled as Persian emperors. Local influences further asserted themselves in governance after the Abbasids weakened and as Islamization took root. After the fragmentation of the Abbasid empire by the ah 4th century/10th century ce, a distinctively Islamic society emerged whose regional rulers upheld its law and institutions such as land-grants (iqṭāʿ), taxation (kharāj and jizya), education (legal madhhab, jāmiʿ and madrasah), and judiciary (qaḍāh). A triangle of governmental authority was established, with the caliph as the source of legitimacy, symbol of community unity, and leader of religious rites; the sultan as the territorial king who maintained the army and monopoly over violence; and the scholars (ulama’) as socioreligious leaders of their respective communities. The caliph or the sultan appointed the local qāḍīs from among the ulama’, who served not only as judges and mediators but also as moral guides and administers of endowments and jurisconsults and counselors, and thus played a key role in the self-governance of classical Islamic societies.

scholarly journals Silencios y repeticiones de la violencia en Colombia. La novela histórica como ontología crítica del presente

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (15) ◽  
pp. 62-91
Author(s):  
Jorge Enrique Blanco García
Keyword(s):  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Space Time ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Ontological Status ◽  
The Past ◽  
Critical Ontology ◽  
The Future ◽  
Novela Historica

This paper addresses the contemporary historical novel as a practice of critical ontology of the present. That is to say, a field of reflection that investigates the current ontological status. In the Colombian case, historical fiction has been attentive to interpret the past of violence and armed conflict in an aesthetic way as a mechanism to understand the future of the present. This essay proposes that historical novels, despite being located in a space-time already travelled, maintain a matrix of meaning anchored in the present reality's interpellation. To this end, this paper analyzes the novels The Crime of the Century (2006) by Miguel Torres and So much blood seen (2007) by Rafael Baena.

The Literary Portrayal of Mehmed II in Turkish Historical Fiction

2007 ◽  
Vol 36 ◽  
pp. 71-95
Author(s):  
Halim Kara
Keyword(s):  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Party System ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Turkish Republic ◽  
Fiction Writing ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
The Status ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
Substantial Change

AbstractThis article examines the portrayal of Mehmed II, the conqueror of Istanbul, in Turkish historical fiction, as well as the literary and ideological implications of his portrayal with regard to Turkish national identity. Since the early Turkish Republic, Mehmed II has been described as a major character in over thirty historical novels. The article argues that over time the literary characterization of Mehmed II in Turkish fiction has undergone substantial change. During the early republican period, historical fiction adopted an ambivalent attitude toward Mehmed II. While one historical novel under discussion focuses mostly on Mehmed II's despotism and aggressive tendencies, another novel contemplates his military bravery and his ability to govern. However, with the arrival of the multi-party system in 1950, these ambivalent approaches toward Mehmed II changed, and he began to be portrayed as the ideal Turkish statesman, gaining the status of a national hero. The latter attitude toward him dominated historical fiction writing as late as in the early 1990s. At that time, Turkish historical meta-fiction began to portray a more complex and ambiguous Mehmed II, thus both challenging as well as re-producing his previous representations.

Historical Novels

1936 ◽  
Vol 5 (15) ◽  
pp. 177-181
Author(s):  
G. Irwin-Carruthers
Keyword(s):  
Historical Fiction ◽  
General Interest ◽  
Historical Period ◽  
Standard English ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
The Real

Does any one ever read Henty nowadays? It is a pity if they do not, for in his unpretentious way he serves as a very good model for one type of historical fiction, and it may upon reflection appear that his is not the worst type to follow. It was his practice to take some historical period of general interest, and into the framework of fact to work the adventures of a fictitious hero; the real historical heroes paced at intervals across the background, the facts of history were generally accurately enough presented, and the dialogue was couched in the ordinary speech of all ages: the more educated spoke the standard English of Henty's own day, the uneducated a sort of conventional Loamshire, which had the advantage of being equally suitable for Kingswear, Kenmare, or Kircudbright. He never attempted to give his books an air of antiquity by plastering them with what passed for the vocabulary of the period.

scholarly journals USING FICTION AS A VEHICLE FOR POPULARIZING HISTORY: JURJY ZAIDAN’S HISTORICAL NOVELS

2015 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Abjar Bahkou
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
World View ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Greek Orthodox ◽  
Islamic History ◽  
Arab Media ◽  
Religious Learning ◽  
Literary Figure ◽  
Islamic Civilization ◽  
New Social Order

Jurji Zaydan was born in Beirut, Lebanon on Dec. 14, 1861, into a Greek Orthodox family. Many of his works focused on the Arab Awakening. The journal that he founded, al-Hilal, is still published today. His writings have been translated from Arabic into Persian, Turkish and Urdu as well as English, French and German. By the time he died unexpectedly in Cairo on July 21, 1914, at the age of fifty three, he had already established himself, in a little over twenty years, as one of the most prolific and influential thinkers and writers of the Arab Nahda (Awakening), but also as an educator and intellectual innovator, whose education was not based on traditional or religious learning. Philip Thomas called Zaydan, “the archetypical member of the Arab Nahda at the end of nineteenth century.” Zaydan transformed his society by helping build the Arab media, but he was also an important literary figure, a pioneer of the Arabic novel, and a historian of Islamic civilization. Zaydan was an intellectual who proposed new world view, a new social order, and new political power. Zaydan was the author of twenty-two historical novels covering the entirety of Arab/Islamic history. In these novels Zaydan did not attempt to deal with the history in chronological order, nor did he cover the whole of Islamic history; rather, his purpose was to popularize Islamic history through the medium of fiction. This paper will offer a brief analytical outline of Zaydan’s historical novels and how his critics viewed them.  

A False Start for the Classical-Historical Novel: Lockhart's Valerius and the Limits of Scott's Historicism

2002 ◽  
Vol 57 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanwood S. Walker
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Test Case ◽  
Historical Novels ◽  
Waverley Novels ◽  
False Start ◽  
Oral Testimony

This essay examines the relationship between a popular but neglected subgenre of nineteenth-century historical fiction, the classical-historical novel, and the Waverley novels of Walter Scott. Using John Gibson Lockhart's Valerius; a Roman Story (1821), the first of the classical-historical novels to appear in the wake of the Waverley novels, as a test-case, the essay demonstrates how this subgenre highlights the limits of Scott's model for historical fiction. The essay first outlines the nature of Scott's favored brand of historicism, which it argues was a genealogical one centered on the oral testimony of witnesses to the past events in question (or their near-descendants). It then assesses Lockhart's attempt to adapt Scott's historicist model to his novel's second-century setting, and argues that for reasons having to do both with the temporal and cultural remoteness of that setting, and with the special status of late antiquity in the nineteenth century, Scott'smodel was not available to Lockhart and subsequent classical-historical novelists. Lockhart's novel thus stands as an instructive "false start" for the nineteenth-century classical-historical novel.

Sir Walter Scott, the Angel of Hadley, and American Historical Fiction

1983 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-227 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Dekker
Keyword(s):  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Sir Walter Scott ◽  
The Self ◽  
American Fiction ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Waverley Novels ◽  
Walter Scott ◽  
Home Territory

From 1815 until about 1840 Sir Walter Scott was America's favorite novelist and much the most important model for her own budding fictionalists – Irving, Cooper, Paulding, Simms, Kennedy, Hawthorne, and others. Yet although fairly accurate estimates of Scott's American sales and circulation have been available for several decades, our understanding of his impact on American fiction has made only modest advances since the 1930s. While echoes of the Waverley novels can be discovered everywhere in American Romantic fiction, usually the louder they sound the more they signal merely the borrower's failure of inspiration or nerve. Scott's example was most fruitful where it was comparatively unobtrusive – partly because the best writers were best able thoroughly to adapt Scott's European scenes, characters, and conflicts to American experience, but also because at its best Scott's influence was of the self-effacing kind that helped Cooper, Hawthorne, and their contemporaries find their own true bent as American writers.On one occasion, however, Scott provoked a more revealing response by invading American home territory.

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