Arabic literature

Arabic literature ( / ALA-LC: al-Adab al-‘Arabī) is the writing, both as prose and poetry, produced by writers in the Arabic language. The Arabic word used for literature is Adab, which comes from a meaning of etiquette, and which implies politeness, culture and enrichment.

Arabic literature, primarily transmitted orally, began to be documented in written form in the 7th century, with only fragments of written Arabic appearing before then.

The Qur'an would have the greatest lasting effect on Arab culture and its literature. Arabic literature flourished during the Islamic Golden Age, but has remained vibrant to the present day, with poets and prose-writers across the Arab world, as well as in the Arab diaspora, achieving increasing success.

Based on the important number of surviving Islamic manuscripts, with a large part of them being in Arabic, Dutch Arabist Jan Just Witkam has argued that "Arabic traditional literature is probably the largest body of literature in the world."

History

Pre-Islamic poetry

Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry is referred to in traditional Arabic literature as al-shiʿr al-Jāhilī, "poetry from the Jahiliyyah". In pre-Islamic Arabia, markets such as Souq Okaz, in addition to and , were destinations for caravans from throughout the peninsula. At these markets poetry was recited, and the dialect of the Quraysh, the tribe in control of Souq Okaz of Mecca, became predominant.

Poets

thumb|Portrayal of the [[Jahiliyyah|Jahili period poet-knight Antarah ibn Shaddad.]]

Notable poets of the pre-Islamic period were Abu Layla al-Muhalhel and Al-Shanfara. The Quran had a significant influence on the Arabic language, and marked the beginning of Islamic literature. Muslims believe it was transcribed in the Arabic dialect of the Quraysh, the tribe of Muhammad. As Islam spread, the Quran was used to help unify and standardize Arabic. It has also been compared to, and sometimes considered, a form of pre-Islamic rhymed prose called Saj. According to the Islamic doctrine of i'jaz (inimitability), inspired by verses in the Quran itself (for example, Quran 11:13) the style of the Quran is not replicable, which has led to the challenge of producing imitations of the Quran. Some Muslims believe that trying to imitate the Quran is forbidden according to Quran 26:224-227.

Rashidi

Under the Rashidun, or the "rightly guided caliphs," literary centers developed in the Hijaz, in cities such as Mecca and Medina; in the Levant, in Damascus; and in Iraq, in Kufa and Basra. A number of stories in the One Thousand and One Nights feature the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid. Al-Hariri of Basra was a notable literary figure of this period.

Some of the important poets in were: Bashshar ibn Burd, Abu Nuwas, Abu-l-'Atahiya, Muslim ibn al-Walid, Abbas Ibn al-Ahnaf, and . Maimonides wrote his landmark Dalãlat al-Hā'irīn (The Guide for the Perplexed) in Arabic using the Hebrew alphabet.

Maghrebi

Fatima al-Fihri founded al-Qarawiyiin University in Fes in 859, recognised as the first university in the world. Particularly from the beginning of the 12th century, with sponsorship from the Almoravid dynasty, the university played an important role in the development of literature in the region, welcoming scholars and writers from throughout the Maghreb, al-Andalus, and the Mediterranean Basin. Among the scholars who studied and taught there were Ibn Khaldoun, al-Bitruji, Ibn Hirzihim (Sidi Harazim), Ibn al-Khatib, and Al-Wazzan (Leo Africanus) as well as the Jewish theologian Maimonides.

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.

Mamluk

During the Mamluk Sultanate, Ibn Abd al-Zahir and Ibn Kathir were notable writers of history.

Ottoman

Significant poets of Arabic literature in the time of the Ottoman Empire included , Al-Busiri author of "Al-Burda", Ibn al-Wardi (died 1349), Safi al-Din al-Hilli, and Ibn Nubata.

The translation of foreign literature was a major element of the Nahda period. An important translator of the 19th century was Rifa'a al-Tahtawi, who founded the School of Languages (also knowns as School of Translators) in 1835 in Cairo. In the 20th century, Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, a Palestinian-Iraqi intellectual living mostly in Bagdad, translated works by William Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, Samuel Beckett or William Faulkner, among many others.

This resurgence of new writing in Arabic was confined mainly to cities in Syria, Egypt and Lebanon until the 20th century, when it spread to other countries in the region. This cultural renaissance was not only felt within the Arab world, but also beyond, with a growing interest in translating of Arabic works into European languages. Although the use of the Arabic language was revived, particularly in poetry, many of the tropes of the previous literature, which served to make it so ornate and complicated, were dropped.

Just as in the 8th century, when a movement to translate ancient Greek and other literature had helped vitalise Arabic literature, another translation movement during this period would offer new ideas and material for Arabic literature. An early popular success was The Count of Monte Cristo, which spurred a host of historical novels on similar Arabic subjects. Jurji Zaydan and Niqula Haddad were important writers of this genre. Some of these neoclassical poets were acquainted with Western literature but mostly continued to write in classical forms, while others, denouncing blind imitation of classical poetry and its recurring themes,

Prominent poets of the Nahda, or "Renaissance," were Nasif al-Yaziji; Butrus al-Bustani founded the journal Al-Jinan in 1870 and started writing the first encyclopedia in Arabic: Da'irat ul-Ma'arif in 1875.

Modern literature

thumb|[[Taha Hussein, referred to as the "Dean of Arabic Literature" (Arabic: عميد الأدب العربي).]]

Beginning in the late 19th century, the Arabic novel became one of the most important forms of expression in Arabic literature. 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. Mohammed Hussein Heikal's 1913 novel Zaynab was a compromise, as it included heavy sentimentality but portrayed local personality and characters.

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After World War II, there was a largely unsuccessful movement by several poets to write poems in free verse (shi'r hurr). Iraqi poets Badr Shakir al-Sayyab and Nazik Al-Malaika (1923–2007) are considered to be the originators of free verse in Arabic poetry. Most of these experiments were abandoned in favour of prose poetry, of which the first examples in modern Arabic literature are to be found in the writings of Francis Marrash, and of which two of the most influential proponents were Nazik al-Malaika and Iman Mersal. The development of modernist poetry also influenced poetry in Arabic. More recently, poets such as Adunis have pushed the boundaries of stylistic experimentation even further.

thumb|[[Aziz Pasha Abaza, poet from the aristocratic literary Egyptian family the House of Abaza of Circassian Abazin origin]]

An example of modern poetry in classical Arabic style with themes of Pan-Arabism is the work of Aziz Pasha Abaza. He came from Abaza family which produced notable Arabic literary figures including Ismail Pasha Abaza, Fekry Pasha Abaza, novelist Tharwat Abaza, Ismail Pasha Abaza and Desouky Pasha Abaza, among others.

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 Syria, Lebanon and Egypt created original works by imitating classical narrative genres: Ahmad Faris Shidyaq with Leg upon Leg (1855), Khalil Khoury with Yes... so I am not a Frank (1859), Francis Marrash with The Forest of Truth (1865), Salim al-Bustani with At a Loss in the Levantine Gardens (1870), and Muhammad al-Muwaylihi with Isa ibn Hisham's Tale (1907). This trend was furthered by Jurji Zaydan (author of many historical novels), Khalil Gibran, Mikha'il Na'ima and Muhammad Husayn Haykal (author of Zaynab). Meanwhile, female writer Zaynab Fawwaz's first novel Ḥusn al-'Awāqib aw Ghādah al-Zāhirah (The Happy Ending, 1899) was also influential. According to the authors of the Encyclopedia of the Novel: