Mahjar Literature

Mahjar literature is that precious contribution of literature, which was produced by those Arab Scholars and poets who immigrated to the different parts of American world, particularly to south and North of America, encouraged by many causes.  There are number of reasons which forced the large number of Arabs to emigrate to the different places of world but these immigrants, while in new culture and land , did not forget their roots and language.  Hence they, besides their daily-life hardships, worked hard for their love and attachment towards development of Arabic language and Literature.

           Migration as such was not a new thing for the Arabs but they had inherited it from their fore-fathers from early period as they had inherited the occupation from their forefathers as ‘Hijrat (immigration) is not a new thing in the Arabs but they have inherited it from their ancestors as they have inherited the occupation of trade’. [1]

           History has been witness to the fact that many migrations took place in the land of Arabia, but these migrations throughout history were motivated by different or at times with similar reasons. Sometimes migration took place because of the human infliction or sometimes by the natural calamities. The most important and famous example suggested by scholars is the migration of Yemenites, which was forced by the destruction of the Ma’arib Dam and the migration of Bani Hilal tribe, who migrated to North Africa burdened under many social causes particularly economic ones[2]. Sometimes these migrations were also motivated by the luxuries and opportunities present in the new lands. But the above mentioned ‘Mahjar Literature’ is the literature which was produced by Arab writers who emigrated to America ‘forming a distinct school of writing’ and in Modern Arabic Literature the term ‘Mahjar literature’ is ‘historically and culturally’ associated with ‘Lebanese and Syrians’[3]. In modern times the literary activities expressed by the Arabic emigrants in part of world is mostly dominated by Lebanese and Syrians, ‘the first illustrious group of Syro-Lebanese prose writers and journalists, who emigrated to Egypt during the reign of Isma’il and afterwards, repelled by the coercive measures of the Ottoman authorities in Syria and Lebanon...’ were those emigrants who contributed to literature in Egypt as ‘ this encounter of Syrian and Egyptian minds was a great factor in the general revival of Egypt.’[4] But ‘Syrians and Lebanese poets who emigrated to America hereafter to be called Mahjaris’[5]. Like immigration to Egypt there was  immigration to North and South America mainly from Syria and Lebanon , as ‘the distinguished authors who emigrated to Egypt, where they settled and took an active part in its intellectual and literary life, the Lebanese and Syrian poets who turned to North and South America left their homeland mainly for political or economical reasons or both’[6]and there the ‘émigrés sought sanctuary in the Mahjar Communities of North and South America where a number of literary groups and societies were soon established’[7]. There were the atmosphere of chaos and disturbance in the economical and political situations of Syria and Lebanon and these acted as the stimulus which left only way for these people to emigrate to West.  Above all, the political instability at home was the cause of emigration but also it is evident that there were the educational and cultural establishments largely in Syria and Lebanon which created in them ‘the new dreams of freedom of speech and enormous opportunities to accumulate wealth ‘[8].

           Scholars have briefly discussed the role of political crisis at home on Mahjar writers and thereby the reaction to this cause is also discussed scholars and critics. Scholars believe ‘indeed the students of Modern Arabic poetry might be surprised to find that politics has had two contradictory effects on the art of poetry in modern Arabic, one positive and renovating, the other reactionary and conventional’ also the effect of economical and cultural activities are also connected to the political situation of a  country and ‘moreover, political events are never sufficient alone to explain the eternal forces at play on poetry, cultural, social and economic forces are inseparable from the political forces.’ [9] ‘The barbarism of rulers and the less availability of employment’[10] were the part and parcel of political instability in these places. Here it is important to mention that unemployment is directly related to the political management of the state, the sectarian riots are also indirectly related to the governmental affairs and it is evident that ‘ instable political situations was a cause but also the sectarian riots forced the residents to escape from these conditions of embarrassment and humiliation.’[11] Besides these forces at work ‘the important force for immigration was the poverty of the people which was inflicted upon them by Dawlatul Usmani or the Ottoman Empire.’[12] The ‘autocratic rule of Sultan Abdul Hamid made life generally difficult for these educated and freedom-loving Arabs’[13] and ‘the political confusion followed, charactered by an increase in Western interference, a hardening of Ottoman rule, and a growing tension between the various religious communities’[14] made life difficult in these places. As the Arabic language had already been given secondary treatment by Ottoman rulers which was an injustice to intellectual and educated class of society and ‘all culture decayed, and the Arabic Language in face of the official language, Turkish...Books, being as yet still hand-written, were rare and expensive, and thus only within reach of a well-off minority, Arabic printing presses were located only in Beirut(one press) and in Istanbul where the emphasis was mainly on printing Ottoman Turkish books or religious texts’.[15]

           The second important stimulating power, which can be regarded as the primary source that proved to be the enlightenment for the people of Syria and Lebanon, was the establishment of Schools and institutions by many external elements and foreign missionaries. These institutions gave much exposure of Thought and insight into new life-style and culture to these people who were directly or indirectly connected to them remarkably “two developments paved the way for the renaissance. In the Levant, European influences began to be felt in the 16^th century. In 1584, Pope Gregory XIII established a special school in Rome for the Lebanese missionaries called the Maronite school. Pope Gregory XIII also helped the students with lands and stipends. Subsequently the Lebanese prince, Fakhr al-Din al-Ma’ari, started sending Lebanese students to study in Italy. Al-Ma’ari also started schools in Lebanon so that the graduates could acquire and spread learning in their homeland.”[16] This school no doubt, was a theological school in nature but it also served the students in learning secular sciences and European languages, literature and philosophy and once these students were back home they started a number of activities on pattern of their experiences observed in Rome.  Likewise they opened ‘schools in the towns and villages of the Levant’ and also students were sent to Rome for education on Scholarship. The important institutions involved in this process were missionaries belonging to Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox Churches and ‘used education as the medium of missionary work’. Later on ‘Lazarites founded a boys school in Damascus, and the Capuchines established their centres in Antioch, Beirut and Aleppo’ while as special attention was paid towards the establishment of training schools for girls by Germans, Danes and British. Americans founded the Syrian Protestant College in 1886 which later on evolved to American University of Beirut. French University was also a result of continuous activities in 1874.[17]In Short, number of ‘missionaries were sent to the area, a network of Catholic schools’ and in this way ‘European editions of Arabic material, mainly biblical and litrergical texts, began to circulate among these communities’[18]. Also “Muhammad Ali Invaded Syria, and for the next decade or so, Syria was effectively under Egyptian occupation, ruled by the Khedive’s son Ibrahim Pasha. One immediate result was a rapid increase in Western educational and missionary activityin the country. Not only were a number of new missionary schools opened during this period but the seeds were also sown for the subsequent development of higher education in the region”[19] as the Renaissance activities of these establishments was very much literary in Syria as compared to its counter state  Egypt and church leaders supported libraries containing valuable Arabic Books.[20] Besides these two reasons emigrants were also motivated by the freedom of speech and thought present in the Western countries. Moreover, the oppurtunites and luxuries furnished their attraction towards new land for the activation of taste for ‘western culture and civilization’[21]. Also when their friends and families discussed this with their accompanies and other social groups it resulted in the more immigrations to the developed states on mentioning the luxuries and life-style of West[22]. Many of the further immigration were motivated by ‘the new dreams of freedom of speech and enormous opportunities to accumulate wealth’[23]. This gives clear indication that political unrest, economical backwardness and attraction of Western life-style and freedom of thought and speech were combiningly inviting these persons, who were forced to leave their land and seeking a better place to live.

           As described by scholars term ‘Mahjar’ remained associated to South and North America immigrants , who were from Syria and Lebanon and began ‘  around 1850 onwards’[24] and gathered momentum in the course of time, so that ‘we find no less than 9210 people emigrating to North America alone in the year 1913’. Arabic literature was produced by Mahjar communities in both North and South America and both were motivated by Western influence, hence contributed to the development of Arabic literature as ‘they exercised a profound influence upon their contemporaries in the Arab lands’[25]. Mostly immigrants were brought up in missionary schools and this trend had developed in them the confidence against traditionalism and courage to march towards modernism as they were filled with ‘ modernist and anti-traditional ideas’[26]. The large number of literature produced by diasporic writers in North and South America during the early part of the twentieth century became a unique and turning stuff in the literary development of stagnant traditional-bound Arabic literature and they tried their poetry at making the point simply and with clarity. Mahjar writers seek to establish a direct contact avoiding the traditional presentation. ‘A formal covering’ they ‘regarded as an unnecessary barrier’[27]. Keeping in consideration the depth of their thought in literary writings, one has to realise that the desire for freedom of expression and stagnancy in the Arabic literature had been a burden on them, while they were in Syria and Lebanon, which was stagnant in literary developments as compared to West. Here it is important to mention that as per some scholars ‘they had been motivated by the luxuries present in the West’ , which we presented in beginning of the chapter, proves of little value because of the literary highness present in the works of these emigrants, which no Arab even at home in luxury and comfort was able to produce. Moreover, Mahjar are sometimes referred to have ‘suffered from a feeling of exile, of lack of belonging’ and ‘living in countries where the language of their literary efforts and of their tradition was not spoken’ , also ‘their striking feeling of homesickness, no doubt intensified by their awareness of being outsiders. This feeling is common to all the emigrant poets without exception, and often underlies their yearning to return to nature and to simple rural life’ and this creates in them the feeling that ‘their cultural existence is at stake’[28]. As we know that the literary growth of Mahjar writers had already initiated and conditioned by modern-styled schools, publications, journals, magazines was totally furnished by their dedication in Western literary world. The immigrants faced  lot of hardships and sufferings in the North and South of America as they were economically downtrodden but in new land they worked very hard and did not restrain from communication with their homeland and did not minimise their love for Arabic culture and language. They held cultural stability with exposure in new land and used to write to their friends and families about the events, stories, hardships, moments and happenings which they came across in new atmosphere. This, not only transformed the living exposure, standard of life-style and expression to these friends and families of theirs but also became a stumilus to that stagnant and traditional-bound literature.[29]

           The challenges which immigrants faced were dealt with great measures by these scholars. There was a gap of culture between the new land they visited and their motherland, however they found themselves living in a heavily assimilationist U.S. context, giving the picture of different cultures Haywood conveys, “the leading Mahjar poets all suffered in varying degrees from understandable malaise in the midst of their new environment. This malaise was material and spiritual”[30]. The question of how to respond to such pressures while also maintaining Arab identity was a matter of great importance to the early immigrant community. Newspapers and journals published debates about how to preserve Arab identity in the American-born generation. In southern America in year 1932, a league was established namely ‘Al-Usbatul-Andulusian’ , by the devoted immigrants but these literary scholars and poets were of opinion that it must follow the ancient style and traditional course of Arabic literature on modern trends. Hence, they held tight to the ancient heritage of Arabic literature and thereby they did not let themselves fully exposed to the western thought, style and meters of poetry in their writings and ‘most of them worked to establish new measures and methods to follow and remain attached to ancient style and thought in Arabic literature’[31]. This South American branch of the Mahjar group was centered in Brazil, on the whole, the group was more conservative than its Northern counterpart and produced few innovations that would challenge the prevailing neo-classical tradition of poetry in the Arab world[32]. There were other immigrants, who emerged as great literary personalities but they did not merge with the Arrabitah league or Andalusia League which include the ‘great poet Ma’sood Samahah, Na’oom Makarzil, Ameen Mashriq, Na’amtul Haaj and above all Amir-ur-Rayhani’[33].

           These immigrants in new atmosphere tried a lot to bridge the gap of culture and be close to the social order as the critics believe ‘such invocation of western literary models suggested not only an attempt to bridge worlds, but a certain anxiety as well. Indeed, Arab American literature of this period often reflected a strong need to prove oneself worthy in the U.S. context’. Great contribution was done to literature from both North and South America and in South America, particularly in Argentina and Brazil but literary activity in the Mahjar communities initially developed at much the same time. The South American tradition in some respects seems ‘to have been longer lasting’[34]. In both North and south Mahjars Arab identity was sustained importantly by newspapers, periodicals and literary circles of various kinds as ‘the need for local Arabic papers and reviews to give them the chance to publish their work and consolidate their position was felt very early by immigrants’. In South America, ‘the first newspaper was ‘al-Fayha’ which appeared in Sao Paulo in 1895 and some 1227 newspapers and periodical titles are recorded as having been produced in Sao Paulo including al-Sharq, besides ‘al-Andalus al-Jadida in Rio de Janeiro. [35] The emigrant poets and writers were having feeling of idealisation of their homeland, and an opposition between the spirituality of the East and materialism of the West, an idea repeated ad nauseam in the work af all these poets’ and these poets reflected ‘sense of isolation and the heightened feeling of individualism’.[36] With this pattern Arabic journalism flourished in Latin America , with, for instance, the illustrated literary reviews ‘al-Andulas al- Jadida’ in Rio de Janeiro edited by Shukrullah al-Jurr and ‘al-Sharq’ founded in San Paolo.[37] The South community of Mahjar faced ‘less developed cultural standard in Latin America compared with the United States’ hence ‘their attitude to the achievements of their Northern brethren varied considerably’[38]. It is therefore evident that differences occurred in the basic literary tastes between North and South. Ilyas Farhat and Rashid Salim al-Khuri (better known as al-Sha’ir al-Qarawi) vehemently attacked their extremism, some of the Southern immigrant writers were of opinion to liberate literature from traditional clutches like ‘Fauzi al-Ma’luf stressed the need for modernity, the need of emancipation from the shackles of the outmoded traditions of the desert Arabs’, but some writers from South directly confronted the literary taste of their Norhtern counterpart as ‘Nima Qazan opposed Jibran to the ancient Arab grammarians regarding him as an example to follow but extremism of Qazan is obviously the exception in Latin Ameerica (Brazil)’ [39]. There was clear difference in aspects of North and South as ‘the basic differences in the poetry of the immigrant arabs in the U.S.A and that of their compatriots in South America‘ we observe three different points ‘first , the poetic contribution of the Southern group is far greater in bulk than that of the Northern group. Secondly, although there were many prose writers in the South, the most famous writers were poets, thirdly, despite the abundance of poetry in the South it was the immigrant poets in the North who provided the rebellion in form, content, diction and tone’. South Mahjar writers, no doubt were much influenced by western writers but they ‘ remained more in the main stream of Arabic Poetry’ while as North Mahjar writers adopted themselves to the literary developments of West besides synthesizing Arab effect, ‘the artistic output of the Northern poets underwent a great change, while the Southern poets remained mild and limited in their attitude towards innovation, despite the fact that, compared with the contemporary poetry that was being written in the arab world, they often showed a broader outlook and a deeper perspective, as well  as a clearer vision of man and life. In form, the classical verse of the two hemistichs and the monorhyme remained the most prevalent, although successful use was made of the quatrain, of shorter meters and of variations of the muwashah type. In theme, aside from the imaginary voyages of the Ma’luf brothers,Fauzi and Shafiq, which displayed originality and courage as well as a definite Romanitc trend, the Southern poets employed much the same themes as contemporary poets in the Arab world. In tone, a large part of the Southern contribution, whether devoted to national themes or to the concise, all-conclusive epigrams typical of Arabic poetry, retained the rhetorical self-assertive, direct tone of Arabic poetry of Classical times’[40]. South poets greatly remained as the nationalist Arab poets while Northern poets remained universal in their approach. As mentioned earlier, the environmental differences between life in the United States and life in Latin America ‘helped to widen the gap between the two groups’, scholars opine South Mahjar group calimed themselves as the ‘missionaries for the spiritual message of the East’ and calling themselves as ‘givers not recievers’, as critics believe that their massage ‘had a great impact on the American media where souls were in need of a spiritual philosophy. [41] Hence this society contained some of the best poets in Latin America and it helped to publish a few volumes of poetry and the eminent among these are “Farhat’s Diwan’s, the diwan of al-Qarawi, Rashid Salim al-Khuri, Fauzi al-Ma’luf’s ‘Ala Bisat al-Rih’ and Shafiq al-Ma’luf’s ‘Abqar’.”  Fauzi al-Ma’luf (1889-1930) contributed in general to the neo-classical school. His most important work is his long poem ‘Ala bisat al-Rih’, in which poet imagines himself going on a journey over the clouds. This poem is in ‘pessimistic tone’ and ‘its imagery work are directly romantic’.

Arabic verses from Ala bisat rih , a new ed., Beirut 1958, page 125-6.

Vision after vision approaches me, when the light was round me why did my eyes see only empty space? The Phantoms composed me round.

           ‘Ala Bisat al-Rih’, is the poem, which despite its purely imaginative content, ‘the poem strikes an authentic note which gives it a special place in modern Arabic poetry’[42]and this poem ‘(on the carpet of wind) are beautiful examples of soul searching’[43].

           Shafiq al-Ma’luf (b.1905), the second of the Maluf brothers, who ‘were the best protagonists of Romanticism’, and this brother’s famous work is a long poem in six parts, “Abqar” (1936) which ‘is perhaps the first example in modern Arabic poetry of a poem crowded with words of a horrific character with which the visual and auditory faculties of the reader are continuously bombarded’[44].

Verses in Arabic from abqar.... Abqar page- 151-2.

See the ogres in their caves, deafening your ears with their din, a pack of monsters flourishing in the forest of your soul or coiling round you, lasting your sides with their tales. [45]

           No doubt, the poet according to some critics had used mythology as a tool but he is best at explaining human’s wild-aspect symbolically. He expresses evil-sides of human in symbols of demons and monsters, residing in the very caves of human body and soul. On the whole Mahjar writers , particularly emigres of south America ‘concentrated on the poetic genres and distinguished themselves in epics and mythological poems’.[46]

           Shafiq al-Ma’luf has three more collections of poetry : li kulli Zahratin Abir, Nida al-Majadhif, and Ainaki Mihrajan. According to Scholars ‘he seemed unable to give any new depth of vision to the theme of love, concentrating on the external description of both love and beauty.

           Ilyas Farhat (b. 1893), whose first volume was published in 1925, “Rubaiyyat Farhat”, which displays ‘ardour and a wide range of interests ,a s well as the characteristically Arab addiction to maxims and philosophical comments on life’. He later on produced “Diwan farhat” and “ahlam al-Ra’i”. He was by far the ‘most spontaneous’ of the poets of all modern Arabic poetry.[47] He was much expressing his ‘personal joy and a deep personal suffering’ in his poems and for which the result was that some Arab critics compared him at times with al-Mutanabbi.[48] Some verses from his “al-Kharif” pictures his creativity;

Verse from Al-Kharif

Oh holders of wells gush with riches, who wear desert with the clothes of spring . the young men are in streets, idle, like your wealth which is frozen in banks.

           Rashid Salim-Al Khuri, another name in the southern Mahjar literary circle, also known as al-Qarawi, is regarded as ‘supreme’ in the annals of natural poetry, as his ‘verse is feiry, emotional and direct’. He produced a collection ”al-Aasir”,  and then he came up with his “diwan” in Sao Paulo. Some of the poems of al-Qarawi on national patriotism are among the greatest in modern Arabic poetry. Rashid and Farhat are the two prominent names who opposed the extremism of AL-Rabita and believed in the Arab heritage and Arab nationalism. Later Rashid became president of al-Usba al-Andulusia[49]. But other writers who experimented with prosifying poetry in imitation of Walt Whitman is Yusuf Asad Ghanim of Brazil.[50] No doubt , the Mahjar literature overall represented Eastern spirit, this is discernible to a greater extent in the works of the emigrants of Latin America than those of North America, and their verse seems to flow in the  more traditional vein of Arabic Poetry mostly in works of ‘Abul Fazi Ayyub, Iliyas Farhat and Rashid al-Khuri’[51]. Outh American Immigrants remained less extremists and certainly less unanimous in their reaction against traditional Arab culture, ‘both in their theory and in their practice’, they show more concern for the preservation of traditional cultural values. While a poet like Fauzi al-Ma’luf advocates a rejection f what he regards as the outmost Arabic poetic tradtion, we find another like Ilyas Farhat confirming his relationship to it. Their selection of names for their literary circles also confirm this reality. In brazil , formation of ‘al-Andalusiyya’ (the Andalusian league) a name clearly connecting to Arab past and a design to establish a link with traditional form.[52]

Section 2. Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyyah in Mahjar Literature.

North American Group of Mahjar Literature is mostly dominated by the emigrants from Syria and Lebanon, who assembled with literary devotion under the establishment called ‘Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya’ or the (Pen League) which was clearly a literary organisation. As discussed earlier, this part of Mahjar was also directly or indirectly influenced by Western Missionaries and centres as ‘communication of West had already impact on the Syrian people, who with the passage of time got much attraction towards western culture and civilization. These immigrants were educated in western pattern schools from their childhood and in new and energetic society they rose to great levels as compared to their brethren back home.[53] North American Immigrants, no doubt, faced a lot of hardships and suffering as they were economically downtrodden, but in new land they worked hard besides they held esteem in communication with their homeland and expressed love for Arabic Literature and culture, and hence they couldn’t restrain themselves from nostalgia.

           There was a gap of culture between the new land they visited and their motherland , however they found themselves living in a ‘heavily assilationist U.S.context as ‘the leading Mahjar poets all suffered , in varying degrees from understandable malaise in the midst of their new environment. This malaise was both material and spiritual.[54]

           The literature of both the parts of Mahjar had great impact on the contemporary literature , no doubt, Arabic literature was produced by Mahjar communities in both North and South America, ‘it is the North American contribution that is better known in the Englsih- Speaking world ( and indeed , the West generally ) largely through the works of Jubran Khalil Jubran- many of whose works are indeed originally written in English rather than Arabic’. The Frist Arabic Newspaper, which was founded in North America was “Kawkab Amrika”, in New York in 1892, besides, nearly ‘135 newspapers and periodical titles are recorded’. The famous ‘al-Fanun’, which was founded by Nasib Aridha, and continued for five years between 1913 and 1918 and was source of expression for renowned writers of North American Mahjar group such as ‘Mikhail Nuayma, Amin-ul-Rihani and Ilya Abu Madi, as well as Jubran Khalil Jubran’. Then there was another publication founded by Abd-al-Masih Haddad, which continued upto 1957 from 1912. In 1929, Abu Madi’s ‘al Samir’ was established. [55] Immigrants tried at many sort of literary activities to maintain their existence and identity in their new home where they were always haunted by isolation and nostalgia, hence ‘Arabic journalism in America states as far as the last decade of the nineteenth century  with the appearance of kawkab America in 1892 . this was soon followed by al-Huda in 1898, and in 1899 by Mir’at al-Gharb in which Jibran and Abu Madi, among others published their work. In 1913 the poet Nasib Arida together with Nazmi Nasim setup al-Funun review which played a significant role in the Mahjar movement and another name in this regard is al-Sa’ih, which came into being in 1912 by Abdul Masih Haddad.[56]

           The North American Mahjar group were more ‘receptive to Western Culture and literary trends’ than other Mahjar writers and Arabs back home. They were well familiar with great Western literature,  particularly the works of American poets like ‘Emerson , Longfellow. Poe, Whitman’ and others. The Arab-American literature which started in the second half of the 19^th century, when Arab immigrants flow began to arrive in North America in significant numbers, was dominated by the ‘AL-Rabitah al-Qalamiyyah’ or Pen League. The literary efforts received support and encouragement more markedly in “the twenties, from this ‘Pen League’ or ‘Pen Assocaiation’ or ‘Arab Writers Union’ (Al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya). This was founded in New York in 1920 by emigrant writers, youthful yet masters and veterans in their right : Jibran Khalil Jibran (1883-1931), Mikha’il Nu’aimah (b.1889), Abdul Masih Haddad (1890-1963), and Nasib Arida (1887-1964)”. [57] This organisation coined name throughout Arab speaking nations and even in other countries, as ‘the influence of this society on modern Arabic literature has been profound’.[58]  Al-Rabitah was the most important and main publishing centre for Arabic works in North America and also ‘home to the most important literary circle of the Mahjar’. It brought together poets and writers of great calibre and multi cultured souls of Arab World. At its beginning , the idea was formulated particularly by “Jubran, al-Rahani and Abu Madi, Mihkail Nuayma and Nasib Arida’ but formally was not at that time established, as its formation ‘date from 1916,but though the name was used sporadically during the next few years, the official founding session of the group did not take place until April 1920”. At its final establishment its constitution was duly formulated, “According to the groups constitution, members of the group were to be divided into three categories”. The first one was ‘ Workers’ and second was ‘Sponsors’ and the third category was ‘Correspondents’, all of whom had a particular job and activity to work-on. ‘Workers’ were the authors and poets, living in New York as immigrants and ‘Sponsors’ were those who supported the al-Rabitah group while as ‘Correspondents’ were those writers and authors who were living outside New York. In the field of publications and translation ambitions it achieved limited merits as ‘it survived until the beginning of the 1930’s, folding only with the death of Jubran in 1931 and the return to Lebanon of Mikhail Nuayma the following year’, still the role and contribution of this Pen League revolutionised the traditional bound Arabic literary world in western Arab communities and Arab literary circles back home.[59] This group had contributed as per their great dealing with both the languages Arabic at home and exposure to foreign literature and language, ‘furthermore, they had undergone undergone hard experiences in their new home. They suffered from nostalgia, from disappointment and failure in their everyday life; they were confronted with a completely different world from that for which the missionary schools had prepared them, and lived in a liberal and dynamic country which obliged them to rise to its standards’[60]. Also ‘ the special education which most of the members of this school,if not all of them, received in their home countries, and in the contemporary intellectual currents in the U.S.A. and the Arab world’. The educational sectarian and regional background of the members of this group can be understood as per their classification given by Nuaimah, as per Moreh , “ Seven members out of ten were from Lebanon and three from Syria. Those three were Nasib Arida, Nudra Haddad and Abd al-Masih Haddad. All of them were from Homs. Eight were Greek Orthodox and two were Maronites. Those two were Jibran and Bahut”, they were greatly influenced by simple diction and style of Bible and ‘ we must also take into consideration the influence of Russian, American and English Literature’.[61]           

           “The aim of the association”, al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya, “was clear: it was to unite then efforts to infuse a new life in modern Arabic literature by turning away from the traditional excessive preoccupation with mere verbal skill, and by seeking to write a literature distinguished primarily by keen sensibility and subtle thought”. These writers wrote the language of spirit and soul, the incarnation of divine spirit by Jibran, ‘born of a smile that revives the heart or sigh that brings tears to the eyes’ and keeping the standard of their coming their together under the devoted belief that ‘ the poet is an angel sent down by the Gods to teach men divine things’. The works were brought forward in the literary products appearing in the periodical “Al-Sa’ih” and Nasib Arida’s review “al-Funun”.[62]

The North American immigrant writers contributed to both prose as well as poetry as ‘the literary contribution of the Arab writers in North America was by no means confined to verse , for as much prose was written as poetry’, but the contribution of these to poetry is also great like in prose. ‘However, a great part of this prose did save the cause of poetry both directly and indirectly’. The examples in this regard ‘M’Nuaima’s Al-ghirbal’ which was the major contribution besides ‘other two authors who wrote on poetry and art were Al-ARaihani and Gibran’ and it were these two who were first that created the ‘possibility of a poem written in prose’ and they suggested others to follow that trend.  Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyyah and personality of Rihani, together, in Northen Mahjar revolutionised the Arabic literature in all forms and genres, in such a short span of time that ‘the school of the Northern Mahjar was and still is a puzzle to many students of this trend in Arabic literature. Within a short period, a group of immigrants from Syria and Lebanon established a new school of Roamntic Poetry[63] based on simple diction influenced also by the Arabic languge version of the Bible. They used strophic verse in most of their work, and at the same time they had a philosophical view of the world , expressing deep religious feeling and using dramatic means to convey ideas’ and therefore supports the view that it developed on the potential of their own but “ Naimy is firm in denying any influence by American literature, and his denial makes it more different to analyse the ideas and methods of this school”[64]

             

Role of AL-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya in Enrichment of Mahjar Literature

The literay development and evolution, which was little active, after long stagnancy, ‘received support and encouragement more marked in the twenties, from ‘the Pen Association or the Arab Writers’ Union, famously known as ‘Al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya’. This organisation was founded for literary identification in the ‘New York in 1920 by emigrant writers’ from Syria and Lebanon, who were great observers and dedicated literary persons. They greatly observed and anylysed the Western culture and literature within short span of time , and moulded it in their culture’s spiritual tides creating a new face of literature which revolutionised the literary activities in East and quenched the spiritual thirst of the West. This association called ‘al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya’ proved to be more successful and influential as compared to all those associations and organisations established during this period and before, no soubt others produced ‘far greater bulk than’ this group in literature, while as this literary society led the wave of innovation in Arabic poetry in Kahjar . the revolutionary literary spirit is actually a combination od ‘the special education which most of the members of this school’ received in their home countries and ‘ the contemporary intellectual currents in the U.S.A. and the Arab world’. When we minutely analyse Al-Rabitah’s regional value, we observe that the basic spirit lies in the members belonging to Lebanon, where most of the members were educated ‘in missionary schools’ who were inbued with ‘modernist and anti-traditional ideas’. Also, they found greater freedom for literary experimentation in U.S.. All the members of this Mahjar association were rebels to traditionalism in Arabic literature and were of great calibre but ‘North American contribution’, nay, whole Mahjar literature ‘is better known in the English speaking world , largely through the works of Jubran Khalil Jubran, amny of whose works were indeed originally  written in English rather Arabic’ who was the driving force behind the formation of this society.

           The concept of ar-Rabitah had been initiated by the best –known and renowned literary personalties of ‘Mahjar’ which including Jibran ,Al-Rihani and Abu Madi. Mihkial Nuaima and Nasib Arida’ in 1916 but this association’s name ‘ was used sporadically during the next few years, the official founding session of the group did not take place until April 1920’ and al-Rihani, the best writer and critic was not present in New York at the time of its formal establishement but had been associated to its earlier activities from 1916. ‘ The three most important personalities of Arab-American literature happened to be associated with ‘al-rabitah’, these were al-Raihani, Gibran and Nuaima, whose courage, originality and mixed cultural background enabled them to impose new ideas and concepts on their contemporaries.’ Hence, ‘these three men did a great deal to bring about a thoroughly liberal attitude towards literature, free of the persistent drawbacks of traditionalism’ through the establishment of al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya’. Also these three were the inspiring souls who transformed ‘ilya Abu Madi, the best of the Mahjar poets, from conventional and realistic approach to that contemplative, highly abstract style typical of his famous poetry.’[65]

           Al-Rabitah were showing ‘a broader outlook and a deeper perspective, as well as a clearer vision of man and life’, as compared to the ‘contemporary poetry that was being written in the Arab’. Other Mahjar writers in South America or in Egypt were mostly having ‘attitudes towards natioanlism’ but the ‘Al-Rabitah tended to be universal in their outlook on the world and mostly believed in the brotherhood of man.’ [66]

           The difference between ‘Al-Rabitah’ writers and those of other Mahjar writers, also lies in the environmental fact which North MAhjar group faced in united States, where the ‘way of life, with its order and material superiority, its impressive impact, its bustle and quick pace’ described as ‘dragon’ was materialistic in all respects, which was quite different from Southern life-Style in Latin America. This materialistic approach was nicely moulded by ‘al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya’ writers with the spiritual philosophy and belief in eternity representing unique Arabic Spirit of poets. They felt this environment to be lacking in spiritual taste, hence they exerted energy and devotion to bring the literature forward for spiritual zenith by writing in Arabic and English at the same time. Also they wanted ‘to infuse a new life in modern Arabic literature by turning away from the traditional excessive preoccupation with mere verbal skill, and by seeking to write a literature that suited the requirements of modern times, a literature distinguished primarily by keen sensibility and subtle thought’, which can be a ‘message of touch’ for soul in East as well as West representing universal approach of their literary activities’ as believing the poet to be ‘an angel sent down by the gods to teach men divine  things.

           The thought behind making this literary society, which was established for enrichment of modern Arabic literature, is based primarily on two basic aspects, as the first was to free the Arab literature from the clutches of ‘the repudiation of traditional excessive verbiage and coventionalism’ and secondly to ‘rise above provinvialism by making literature’ the expression of universal human thought and feeling expressed by Nuaimah in his milestone critical work al-Ghirbal (The Seive) [67]Al-Rabitah association, hence, denounced traditional Arabic prosody for restricting the free expression of emotion that is regarded as essential for scontemporary poetry. This was the ‘most important statement of the poetic principles underlying Mahjar’ particularly the pen Assocaition or Al-Rabitah.[68]

           Al-Rabitah were the first, who defied the traditional method in poetry and tried to adopt Western themes, rhyme scheme, metaphors and techniques, as they were suffering from nostalgia, having hard experiences in their new home and confronted with a completely different atmosphere  and hence they were in need of expressing their inner world, and therefore the result was in the shape of ‘revolution in themes, diction, form and metaphor in Arabic literature’.[69]

           The development and progressive adoption of ‘free verse-a form of expression wich retains some at least of the characteristics of poetry, but in which there is no discernible or formal metrical scheme’-took place at the hands of famous writer of Al-Rabitah Jibran Khalil Jibran, who believed in the essentiality of relying ‘on a rhythm of thought as a substitute for formal metrical or rhyme schemes’. This style of poetry, which was a reflection of ‘Walt Whitman and the French Romantic poets’, penetrated into modern Arabic literature mainly through the works of Jibran and Rihani, who inspired later poets like ‘the Palestinian Tawfiq Sayigh (1929-71) and the Lebanese Unsi al-Hajj (1937-)’[70], but the fact remain that ‘ the mood and tone of Arabic prose poetry in the hands’ of these two writers, has little in common with the earlier efforts of Jibran and his colleagues, therefore a ‘new phenomenon was quickly marked by a change of terminology from Shi’r manthur to qasidat al-nathr, a term used for the first time, giving reference of Juyyusi , starkey writes in1960.[71]

           Al-Rabitah also contributed eminently in the ‘prose-poetry’ (shi’r manthur) particularly at the hands of its head the ‘writer, poet and artist’ Jibran Khalil Jibran’, who contributed a huge number of works on ‘prose poetry or Shi’r manthur’ from 1903 on, in which he attempted to bridge the gap between poetry and prose, using techniques that married the influence of French Romantic poetry with that of Arabic translations of the Bible. Jibran was first of the Mahjars whose attempt ‘to contribution to the development of the Arabic novel is hampered by a number of factors, not least the fact that by many of his best known works most notably the Prophet’ and other works ‘[72]deserve a prominent position in any account of the development of Arabic prose fiction, both for their distinctive style and for their thematical material, and these works are both idiosyncratic and at times at least, egocentic’.

           The ‘Pen Association’ in Modern Arabic literature is known for its contribution in development of Strophic Verse, which they used in most of their work and at the same time furnishing the philosophical view of the world, by expressions of deep religious feeling and using dramatic means to convey their ideas. Also al-Rabitah became a name famous in terms of contribution to ‘the use of Strophic verse’, ‘the deep religious feeling’, ‘the criticism of clergy’ and ‘feudalism in their homeland’ and use of simple poetic diction. All this is reflected in their poetry, which is enlightenment of their humanism, their freedom of thought and their attitude towards the authority of the Church, Biblical diction, Christian symbols and ideas. This was much shaped by their close acquaintance with Western literature, especially with the works of American poets like Longfellow, Poe, Emerson and Whitman and their perfection in more than one Western language helped them to understand many literary genres of contemporary age which ‘enabled them to lead the revolt against the conventional style of Arabic prose and poetry’.[73] As Romanticism of European literature had revolted against classical school, so was Al-Rabitah ‘a revolt against all that was traditional in Arabic prose and poetry’, because they demanded ‘to express life as it is reflecting human emotions’. They wanted to revolutionise the whole that was unfit in the concept of modern poetry like ‘Eulogy, Satire and self praise , which was worn out with age’[74]. The eminent famous and personality  belonging to Al-Rabitah, revolted against conservative trend of the Arabs and therefore demanded a new evolution of literature. It declared the role of literature with preference to the spiritual rather than the material aspects of the human behaviour.[75]

           In other words, al-rabitah were the foremost who wanted to establish a direct contact with simplicity and clarity avoiding the traditional presentation, regarded the formal procedures to be an unnecessary barrier. The challenge faced by Mahjar gave way to ‘the great ideal of individual freedom, dominated by North American Group, who established individualism in comparison to the circumstances. This individual, as poets of North were more ‘noted for their adventurous spirit’, which was fruitfully creative in the works by their being aliens in a strange land which stimulated their imagination. The poetry in North was consciously bent on innovations, while as the poetry in South represented vinility and strength of approach. No doubt, North American group was praised in all Arab literary circles, but they were also abused ‘for weakness detected in the language of their poetry’.[76]

           So far as prose is concerned, al-Rabitah’s head and influencing writer Jibran Khalil Jibran acted ‘as a bridge between contemporary Western ficiton’ and the newly ‘developed artistic practitioners of Middle East’. He also acted as the bridge who transformed the Western mystical message of Blake’s and ‘Niezsche’s glorification’, through some of the philosophical poems like the Processions or his poems which represent a ‘need to return to nature’, as he put it,  al-Ghab (Woods). The five members of Al-Rabitah ‘Jibran, NUaimah, Abu Madi, Rashid Ayyub, Nasib arida’ are the cheif figures of Mahjar poetry’ and ‘their output can be regarded as typical of the entire’ Mahjar movement, and among them was dominant personality of JIbran, who influenced all others.[77]

           Al-Rabita poets used highly spiritual and religious symbols. ‘Many Hymns expressed the philosophical idea of the yearning of the soul to unite with God, to achieve its eternal zest, the idea is expressed in the Psalms’, representing empty life on earth and the eternal glory on Heaven, believing that ‘everything returs to its place of origin, thus the soul which derives from God, yearns always to go back to Him’, hence reflecting the ‘religious mysticism’.[78] They discarded, from the start and hence tried to make a path to show that ‘poetry was no longer bogged down by the meticulous’ following of metre and rhyme, as they clearly stated that ‘if you think that poetry is mere metre and rhyme’, then ‘you are not one of us’[79] giving preference to the soul of the poetry. The South American émigrés were not able to reach this zenith of ‘Al-Rabitah’ and also it was markedly appreciated ‘for its psychological studies, spiritual teachings and moving short stories and novels’.  Al-Rabitah is believed to be the most active writers who ‘liberated Arabic from its sterile form, particularly with the efforts of Jibran who combined ‘prose with the art of painter, the sculptor, the musician and the poet’, and he is the first who combined different forms of art in Arabic world.[80] Jibran’s poetic pieces or prose poetry in general, directly influenced a great number of the poets and writers of the thirties and forties, regarding it the new style in literature , ‘known effectively as the “Gibranian Style”, and this extra-ordinary experiment was a source of inspiration afterwards. North American writers, dominated by ‘al-Rabitah’ did not deal with social or political environment around them in American nor did they wrote on stressing the developments “taking place in the political , social, cultural and psychological spheres in their home countries” but they dealt literature to the highest universal merits of ‘Nature and Man in Nature and in the Universe’ which reflects the universal thought above the boundries of time and space.[81]

Jibran Khalil Jibran

Mahjar literature which is dominated by the North American emigrants, so is the North American Mahjar literature dominated by the Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya and in the same way this circle of Mahjar is dominated by the works of great scholar, writer, philosopher, artist, sculpture- Jibran Khalil Jibran. Critics believe that ‘of the Mahjar writers in north America, the name of Jubran Khalil Jubran (1883-1931) has acquired almost cult status’ and he ‘is the greatest literary figure in Arab letters’ and he definitely is ‘a mixture of the sage, the rebel and the poet’.[82] Jibran Khalil Jibran who inspired a whole generation of writers in developing Mahjar literature was born of poor parents and brought up in  conditions of squalor and poverty and in a downtrodden and disturbed family as ‘ his father was indolent and alcoholic, whose frequent tantrum terrified the youngster’. His mother, the daughter of a priest, was an intelligent women and resolute but helpless in the atmosphere of tension and brutality. [83]Jibran is one of the distinguished products of the Hikma school in Beirut. His family ‘unable to improve their lot at home ‘ decided to migrate ‘to the United States in 1895, to bury poverty forever’ and settled in Boston in its Chinatown. But life in America with its emphasis on material progress evoked a strong reaction on Jibran. In 1898, he went to the Lebanon to learn Arabic. He Joined Madrassa al-Hikma (The Law school) where he also took lessons in French, Arabic and the Bible.[84] While in America , ‘his mother, sister and Step-brother died from tuberculosis in 1902 and 1903 and Jubran was at first forced to live on money earned as a seam-stress by his other sister, Marianna’[85]. His belief was shattered by the death of his sister Sultana and it ‘drove him to anguish’, he conveyed himself ‘my God died with Sultana. How can I live without God’[86] . Druing this stressed period Jibran took to painting and also started writing. He contributed many writings and articles to the different Arabic newspapers established in America particularly ‘Arabic newspaper al-Mahajir and the Jounral al-Funun, which were followed by his first major work, in the shape of a book on music. In 1904, Jirbran met Mary Haskell, in his exhibition of paintings, the women who was to change the course of his life, until in 1907 he found a protestress in Mary Haskell, the owner of a private school, who admired his painting as well as his writing and who encouraged him to go to Paris to study Modern art, because she recognizedJibrans’s talent for painting and writing.[87] He spent three years in Paris stufying painting. In Paris he is claimed to have known the sculptor Rodin, and was introduced to the work of William blake, whose poetry and painting, together with the work of Neitzsche, were destined to have a profound effect upon him. After three years in Paris Jibran returned to the United States in 1912 and settled down in New York.[88] There he setup a studio, where he lived for twenty years, never leaving it except for a stroll in the Central Park, or to visit his sister in Boston. There is a unique view presented about Jibran’s studio by MiKhail Nuaimah, as he conveys , “Arida ,Haddad and I were invited by Gibran to spend the evening at his studio which was known to the small coterie of his Lebanese and Syrian friends as ‘the Hermitage’ and which I was quite anxious to see. The studio was on the third floor of an old, brick building which gave me, as I entered it , the feeling of entering a monastery” and “the Hermitage was a room of about nine yards in length and six in width”. “That was ‘the Hermitage’, it spoke more eloquently of Gibran’s poverty and his magnificeint struggle against it than of his love for austerity and self-denial. It also spoke more of the storms tossing his hearts and mind than of his serenity and contentment in his poverty”[89]. Jibran ‘was the most influential figure among the immigrants literary community. His rebellion against out worn social customs and religious tyranny , no less than his total rejection of outmoded literary modes and values, made him an inspiration for the younger generation of writers’. All of his works dominated the literary pieces in terms of depth of thought and much of his work is marred by ‘mawkish sentimentality’ but most remarkably , there is no doubt that he played an important, ‘indeed a crucial’, roel in familiarising readers and scholars of Arab with the thoughts and ‘ideas and ideals of Romanticism’. He was deeply connected with his roots in Arab as ‘his extended literary and amorous correspondence with the poetess Mayy Ziyada’ shows his ‘close contact with members of the Arabic literary establishment in the Middle East’.[90]

           In New York , he met several émigré writers from the Lebanon and Syria and in this way in 1920 with the efforts of these contactees and with the help of ‘Mikhail Nuaima, Nasib Arida and Abdul Masih Haddad, he established the Pen Association of Arab Writers, al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya to become its moving spirit’. It is obvious, Jibran was the driving force behind the formation in 1920 of this association, who elected him president. The association ‘included the distinguished poets Nasib Arida, Mihkail Nuaima and Rahsid Ayyub’. This was the most productive period of Jibran’s life. His writings in English and Arabic started winning him wide acclaim. His contribution is great, besides painting , he wrote essays, short stories, books of medications, poems ‘both in traditional forms and in vers libre’ as well as much poetic prose with strongly marked biblical echoes’[91]. He coined name in both the languages ‘Arabic and English by his contribution to the both literatures’. His writings are influential and varied. He wrote ‘eight important books in Arabic and an equal member in English. His Arabic books include:

1.       Ara’is al-Muruj (Brides of the Valley)

2.       Al-Arwah al-Mutamarrida (Spirits Rebelious), collection of short stories.

3.       Al-Ajnihat-al-Mutakassira (Broken Wings) a novel.

4.       Dam’a Wa Ibtisama (A tear and a smile) articles in poetic prose.

5.       Al-Mawakib (Processions) poetry.

6.       Al-Awasif (Tempests) which contains his reactions to the First World War)

Clud His fame as a poet rests chiefly on his long poem ‘The Processions’ which was first Published in New York in 1918. ‘It consists of 200 lines arranged in a rather irregu;ar stanzaic form, the regular stanza consisting of a quartrain of one metre (al-Basit) followed by another quartrain and a couplet of another metre (Majza al-Ramal)’. Although structurally the poem is interesting in that it rejects the monorhyme qassida form, a feature which is to be found in the work of most of the Mahjar poets. In its ideas and themes , ‘The Processions’ mainly occupies such a crucial position in the poetry of Mahjar.

     His writings are mostly influenced, as per critics, by his keen interest in the ‘teachings of the Bible, Toreh and Buddhism, and in the personalities of Christ, Mohammad and al-Imam Ali’. Besides he was equally exposed to ‘the culture of Europe’, and was having ‘impact of the Refoems, of Balzac, Rodin, and Blake, of the movement of Art for Art’s sake, and of European music is seen in all his works’.[92]

     Jibran wrote freely in all genres of literature as he ‘contributed to Arabic poetry in three ways :firstly, through his poetical prose; secondly, through his verse ; and thirdly, through his various writings on poetry, language and art in general’. Jibran was greatly devoted to prose writing, ‘although many of those who wrote on him regard him as a poet, noy only for the verse he wrote, but also because of some of his prose’[93]. ‘Although most of his prose in poetic, some of it is in higher than the rest’ which heightened pieces are called ‘Hawi’ prose poem,and ‘al-Ashtar articles’ but they will be referred to as poetic pieces, or prose poetry in general. Jibran was a poet of nature as he wanted to have solitude in ‘al-Ghab’ or the woods as he ‘was not an escapist, and the forest in his writings was not a place of escape but was used as a symbol in the effort to solve the problem of human differences; conflict and congruencies through an all embracing love’.[94]

     He is regarded as ‘most daring among the writers who liberated Arabic from its sterile form’who combined prose with the art of the painter, the sculptor, the musician and the poet. He is regarded to be the first Arab , in him the merging of different art forms appears for the first time in Arabic artist world. Jibran was made up of complete and beautified set of artistic endeavours like ‘Zest for Nature, a power of contemplation, a passion for freedom, a love of romance, all come surging up’ in Jibran’s exquisite writings.[95]

     Jibran’s work together with his co-writers ‘ a Christian spirit as well as Christian attitudes yet unexplored in poetry were to make themselves felt’, but we must bear in mind that Islamic cultural affinity, that with the philosophical and spiritual teachings of East scholars shaped this aspect in the Mahjar poets, embellished with the Western influence and Christian thought.  Scholars believe that ‘Religious motifs and themes in North American Mahjar poetry’ which also resembles to the Quranic verses ‘kun fa yakoon’ as he says in the poem al-Rafiqa (the girl friend),  ‘the last sentence of the poem runs as follows : ‘Awwalu Nazratin min Sharikati al-Hayati tuhaki qawla Illahi, Kun’, the first glance of the partner for life resembles the word of God ,Be.[96] Here it represents his understanding of Quranic literature as well. He was ‘rebellious against society , the Clergy, outdated traditions’ besides his ‘great love of freedom, his deep belief in human brotherhood, his great zest for spiritual progress were infectious and stimulating’ and his highest achievement which lies in his ‘unconscious belief in the inner freedom of the individual’. This all was the combination of Gibranian Existence and which gave him his unique style marked by highly imaginative vein.  Then having achieved selflessness, he became universal in his approach and ‘he was now writing for a universal audience and dealing with wider human problems. Leaving behind his romanticism he wrote in the Symbolic strain explaining his ideas in the forms of allegories and sayings in free flowing, easy expressions.’[97]Jibran’s imagery is often ‘highly Symbolic’. In fact Jibran’s symbols of which the ‘forest, the sea and the night are the most important, anticipated more the symbolism of some of the poets of the fifties and sixties rather than the Symbolsim of poets such as Sa’id Aql who flourished in the late thirties and forties  and who looked to French nineteenth century Symbolsim. The former are symbols, as Gibran did, to denote a point of reference, to represent more richly and concretely, a basic idea. The latter use sounds and symbols to evoke impressions and meanings in a magical, suggestive method’[98]. His greatest work universally acclaimed ‘The Prophet’ in which his philosophy, built on love, reached its climax and which made him the most popular Arab writer in the West. This work, writes a scholar Irfan Shahid[99];

“Gibran Kahlil Gibran, the foremost Arab American writer twenty eight years after his advent in 1895, a slim volume of his, less than a hundred pages, which could be read in an hour, appeared in print titled ‘The Prophet’. It received a wide and immediate vogue and its popularity has not waned in the course of the last eight decades or so since its publication. The sale of the book ran into the millions, more than eight according to the most reliable estimate. Thus, the Prophet outsold all American poets from Whitman to Eliot. According to its publisher, Alfred Knopf, the book’s success was entirely due to its own appeal since no publicity whatsoever has been mounted to promote its sale. In addition to the sale of these millions of copies, the book has been translated into all major and some minor languages of the world, according to some estimates into fifty. Consequently, Gibran is the only Arab or Arabic-Speaking author who succeeded in authoring a book that has had this extensive presence in the four corners of the Earth.”

     The artist in Jibran, his passion for truth, his mystic stance and the impetus he gave to new literary trends mark him out as an outstanding man of letters, commending universal acclaim[100].

Rashid Ayyub

Rashid Ayyub(1872-1941)  was born in Lebanon in the same village as Nuaima. He left for paris in 1889, where he spent nearly three years, after which he returned to his native country. He stayed, little while in Lebanon and then left again for Manchester. ‘from Manchester he emigrated to the United States, where jis life was never free from financial worries. He joined the New York circle of expatriates and with them formed al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya. He was greatly influenced by Gibran and according to Badawi ‘the most striking example of Jibran’s Influence of Mahjar Poetry can be sen in the work of Rashid Ayyub (1872-1941)’. Such great was the impact of Jibran’s influence that it did’nt ruin the individuality of the influenced, Rashid Ayyub but let him create his own unique identity. Critics believe that ‘Ayyub is not of the same calibre as Abu Madi, Arida or Nuaima. He wrote some interesting poems of great spontaneity and unquestioned sincerity, such as ‘spring’, in which the return of spring does not bring joy to the poet, but only arouses his memories of the spring of his childhood in his native village in the Lebanon, or his portrait of the poet, obviously a self-potrait, under the title ‘He is Gone and We Knew Him Not’ , a poem moving in spite of, or rather because of, the vague feelings it evokes’. Badawi also claims that ‘ but even these poems are thin in their intellectual content, compared with the best work of the other poets’.[101]

            Rashid Ayyub produced his three collections and all ‘the three volumes of verse’ were published in New York, they include ‘Al-Ayyubiyyat’ in 1916; ‘Songs of the Dervish’ in 1928 and finally ‘Such in Life’ in 1940. After the year of publishing ‘such in life’, he died in United States in1941.        

            “songs of Dervish”(1928) AND “Such In life”(1940) reflects the clear impact and influence of jibran on Rashid Ayyub’s verses because ‘the largest part of Ayyub’s first volume was written before he fell under the influence of Jibran’ ans the comparison between this and latter two volumes is clear and evident as “Nuaimah says in the introduction to Ayyub’s work ‘it is as if it had been written by another man’.” Giving brief description of ‘Ayyubiyyat’ Badawi writes, “in al-Ayyubiyyat the reader finds many of he features of neoclassicism, such as the use of long and stately mteres, of resounding words, stock imagery and hyperbole, of traditional genres like panegyric, elegies and description , the imitation ofclassical models. His descriptive poem of New York is neoclassical in tone and language. Ayyub writes about social and political occasions, like the meeting of an Arab conference in Paris, the famine in the Lebanon and the first world war, he also writes about major events like the Titanic disaster”. Critics claim that it would be wrong that if one claims that al-Ayyubiyat is a thorough –going neoclassicist, but he believes that this volumes presentation gives signs and ways of his future development, some of the later poems of al-Ayyubiyat are greatly influenced by Gibran’s philosophy of being at peace with nature only. Like the poem entitled , “What am I?”.

            Rashid Ayyubs anthology ‘Aghani l-darwish’ contains forty poems ; two poems are in strophic verse whiloe four are in prose. The poem ‘Hiya ‘l-Dunya’ consists of separate verses in couplets, fixed rhyme and stanzas in different metres.[102]

            In ‘Aghani’l-Derwish’ and ‘Such in Life’, it is found that the neoclassical elements present inearly poetry is tatally absent. As ‘the declamation and rhetoric have been replaced by a much quiter tone ; short metres and multiplicity of rhymes are now dominant’. Also the poet, who earlier took issues of social and political elements now turned his back on them and seeking escape in nature and withdrawing himself into an inner world of romantic dreams’, which coined him a name darwish in ‘al_rabita’ circle, as he took to the titles like ‘lost hopes, “the Meaning of life”, “the trembling Leaf”, “Isle of Oblivion”, “through The Mist” and “the Distant Light”. Here it was perfect influence of Jibran upon Ayyub that ‘only link with the outside world that remained in his poetry was his nostalgia for his homeland, a feature which we have already encountered in the poetry of the  whole movment.’[103]

Nasib Arida

            Nasib arida was born in Hims in 1887, and received his primary education in a Russian school. He moved to the Russian Teacher’s Training College, ‘where he met Nuaima and Abdul Masih Haddad, who was also to be a member of the al-Rabita in New York’[104].’ He was a poet of lesser importance, ‘nonetheless played an important role in the development of modern Arabic poetry. In the first place he was a pure Romantic who, without indulging in sentimentalism, brought about a permanent change in several fundamental aspects of peotry’[105].

            In 1905 Nasib Arida emigrated to the United States and here settled in New York ‘ where he ahd difficulty in earning his living by means of commerce’. And in 1912 he setup the ‘Atlantic Press and in the following year he cooperated with Nazmi Nasim in the literary review al-Funun’. Comparing Arida to madi, Juyyusi puts it , “while Ilya Abu Madi alternated between the old , loud, exhibitionistic of later poetry, Nasib Arida achieved a more permanent change of tone. Because he abhorred didacticism, his tone is soft and subdued the tone of a poet, who is given to meditation, and who indulges in introspective explorations and soliloquies within his own soul’[106]. Nasib Arida, who was classmate to Nuaimah at Russian school and when he established al-Funun in New York and ‘the early link formed between the two men provided one of the bases for the formation of “Al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya” in 1920’.[107] While Abu Madi poetry is charecterised by clarity and directness, Arida’s poetry is a step nearer obliqueness, as meaning became more complex and implied rather then clarity stated. One sees the beginning of the use of privately created symbols in the modern, rather than the nineteenth-century French poetic tradion.[108] Abu Madi and Arida, no doubt belong to the same literary society and faced the same social, cultural and political environment  but there are ‘many points which form an interesting contrast’. Arida was comparatively free of traditional shortcomings while same ‘cannot be said of Abu madi, but Arida ‘never achieved the often beautiful organic unity of some of Abu Madi’s poems’. Arida was not so inventing and creative in its writing as Abu Madi was as ‘Madi was very skilful in adopting or inventing an idea and building around it’. The speciality of Nasib Arida, as per Critics,is that Arida ‘wrote mostly on abstract themes, explores his own experiences’. And he was more concerned with the truth and with leaving an impression on the reader. For this sincerity, ‘Arida comes foremost among the poets of the North Mahjar’[109].

He ahs great achievement in Symbolical usage of Mythology, ‘although Gibran had proceeded him in the use of myths when he wmployed the Phoenician myths of Tammuz and Ishtar’, Arida was using the myth to ‘symbolise the dep yearning of man for spiritual illumination and his quest for the impossible and the elusive’.‘Al-Arwah al-Haira’, the literary work of Arida got published posthumously after his sudden death in 1946. He has coined special name and gained a special place as he is ‘remembered as a poet of introspection and of spiritual moods, who explored the world of the subconscious’. [110]

            He fell ill in 1942, after which he ceased to write poetry and in this way after long illness he died in1946. Then his poems were collected and published in 1946 in one volume  ‘Troubled Spirits’ or Al-arwah al-Hair, as mentioned above, though appearently some of his works remains unpublished. Giving details of the title, badawi writes, “the title of his Diwan is in fact indicative of the nature of its contacts. ‘Arida’s poetry is an expression of the quintessence of romantic sorrow to him more than to any other Mahjar poet Shelley’s words are applicable our Sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought’[111].

            Arida, too was, like other poets of Mahjar, particularly Al-Rabitah writers, troubled by materialism present in American Society and deeply concerned with nostalgic waves of his soul, and one of his most famous and successful poems, in which he expresses his condemnation of New York life and his nostalgia for the Lebanon is “A Fruit Basket” (1920). The poet, ‘unable to sleep at night goes for a walk in the street of New York where the crowds, the bright lights, the bustle and indifference of people rushing in pursuit of their pleasures and sophisticated entertainment all make him feel very much of an outsider and intensify his loneliness. His eyes fall on a basket full of grapes, figs and pomegranates displayed in a grocer’s shop, and the light of these oriental fruit sends him dreaming of a past of pristine beauty and simplicity in the past of the world of his own origin.’ This reflects the poets way of taking refuge and receiving sigh of relief through imagination. The world of imagination reflects ones highnesss of intellect and his greatness of inner-taste, in which he lives more than his physical world.[112]                In all these years, he retained his  independence of thought and did not Jibran’s “preoccupation with man’s sorrows and the dark facts of life that cause despair and malaise” and to Nuiama’s robust realism[113]. But Ismat believes that Abu Madi ‘ was torn between his awareness of human sorrow and the desire to enjoy life. Arida  wrote on different topics but the appeal in all these is not limited to a particularity but subjects are of universal and permanent value’, Which was a reflection of his poetic talent and greatness of selection of poetic theme.[114]

            Nasib Arida anthology al-Arwah al-Haira (New York 1946) contains ninety-two poems composed between 1912 and 1942.[115]

Mikhail Nuaimah

                Mikhail Nuaimah, born in Biskinta, Lebanon and ‘nurtured in different cultural Millieus’ was ‘the celebrated critic of the Mahjar School,who soared to fame in the period between the two World Wars’[116] and was the one who transmitted the ‘written ideas to Middle Eastern society’ as he first  attended the Russian school in Nazerath.  Then he went to Diocesan Seminary in Poltova, Ukraine, where he became acquainted with the works of Tolstoy and other modern Russian writers, and he was so much inspired by his writngs and ideas that he developed an admiration for Tolstoy’s social ideas. At school, he was already in contact with another ‘Mahjar Poet-to-be’ Nasib Arida (1889-1946). Nasib Arida was the person who later on became the publisher Al-Funun in New York and scholars believe that the “early link between the two men provided one of the bases for the formation of Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya  in 1920”. It was in 1911 that Mikhail Nuaimah emigrated to United States and there, after taking ‘law degree at the University of Washington, Seatle, was drafted into the United States army, reaching the front line in France a few days before the armistice of 11 November 1918’. For the next decade he worked as travelling salesman and in 1932 returned to Lebanon.[117]

            Mikhail Nuaimah showed an early flair for poetry and composed his first poem ‘The Frozen River’ in Russian, and was great and a prolific writer, who produced ‘more than thirty volumes of poetry, prose,drama, biography, essays and literary criticism.’ He greatly became the best critic among the Mahajr group as he ‘rests above all on his literary criticism’. His Al-Ghirbal (1923) in which his critical essays were clearly denouncing the traditional Arabic Poetry, for he believes that it restricts the free expression of emotion, which is ‘essential for contemporary poetry’. Paul Starkey counts Al-Ghirbal as best work, as he puts it, “This work may be regarded as one of the most important statements of the poetic principles underlying Mahjar, and indeed , Arabic Romantic poetry generally. He has contributed a small ‘poetic output’ among these most poems published in a ‘slim volume entitled Hams al-Jufun in 1943’, but his poem Akhi, in particular, has received a great appreciation and fame throughout the criticism of Arabic World. [118]

            Mikhail Nuaimah is the ‘third literary figure to have impact on Mahjar poetry in North America’, after Rihani and Gibran. He was a ‘critic, poet, essayist and mystic’. His criticism, besides collections in Al-Ghirbal , criticism essays ‘are scattered in his many books of collected essays which he published in the course of his forty years. His educational background became a source for his literary outlook on the Western literature, for he was exposed to the different literatures from schooling to higher education, as ‘Nuaima Studied at the Russian Teachers training College in Nazareth until the age of seventeenth, then went on a scholarship to Russia to continue his education. After five years in the University of Poltova he then immigrated to Washington in 1911 and there he entered the university in 1912 to study law’. This multicultural exposure, during which Nuaimah was keen in observing literary developments in particular country’s culture, gave him the tendency of being one of the greatest critic of al-Mahjar, as ‘it was in 1913 that Nuaimah discovered his critical abilities’. His initiation in criticism began with Fajr al-Amal ba’da lail al-Yas, which ‘included attack on what he called “mummified literature”: the literature of imitation and decoration’. He vehemently, in his first article, expressed a desire and ‘necessity for a drastic change’, which is also called as ‘a revolution in Literature’ and this all was his reflection and heed towards ‘a comparison with Europeon literature, and Russian literature’. He published his subsequent writings in the Nasib Arida’s Al-Funun which was very well appreciated and welcomed by his readers and by other literary figures in North America. During these two years he got so much fame that it made Nasib Arida to say that ‘ his articles had made Al-Funun popular in Syria, Egypt and in the Southern Mahjar’.  Al-funun which became a source to present his creativity was permently suspended during the war and it was then Al-Sa’ih  of Abd al-Haddad -his former classmate-,’became the platform for Nuaima’s critical writings’. Later on Nuaimah stressed ‘on establishing a real change in the form, language,attitude and methods of approach of Arabic poetry.[119]

            Al-Ghirbal was having a special place when it comes to its impact on al-Rabitah, as the Critics believe that this book was like ‘a manifesto of Mahjar literature and this propagated the early messages of the ‘Pen Assocaition’ and hence practically , he also helped expressed thoughts and ideas to get into reality at the establishment of Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya. When al-Ghirbal came into existence ,another book on criticism also came at the contemporary period Al-Diwan fi’l Naqd wa’lAdabi, in Egypt but the Critics defending AL-Ghirbal, to be independent of any effect from the work write that ‘it was only in1922, appearnetly, that the two avant –garde movements in Egypt and America came into contact with each other’[120]. Nuaimah  was greatly attached to Jibran spiritually and ‘during the twelve years they were together in New York’ and hence shared the highest thoughts and these thoughts and its intensity was  presented in ‘Nuaimah’s Biography of Jibran’ written with all the love he had for him and this work became a ‘beautiful testament to their friendship’ and such was the attachment between them that ‘Nuaima only forty-two, preferred to retire from civilization and society’ after Jibran’s death. This coined for him a special name “The Hermit of Shakrub” because he remained ‘a bacholar’ until his death in 1989.

            ‘Nuaima’s poems numbering twenty-four were composed mainly between 1917 and 1930. They were collected in one volume Hams al-Jufun ( Eyelids Whispering). Though few in number these poems, yet they are important both from the point of view of Nuamia’s philosophy, and as per ‘the development of Mahjar poetry’.

            However,  Jayyusi critically analysing Nuaimah describes that “Nuaima’s ideas on metre, however, are not quite so mature. He makes many mistakes and fall into some contradictions as he attacks the sham versifies of his time” and “his ccriticism of exaggeration and banality in poetry, which he refers to the laws of prosody, is irrevelant and shows a hasty judgement”, while refutes that , “Every poetry has its laws of prosody whether written or orally transmitted, Quantative metres may have stricter laws, but this springs from the very nature of language and the inter-relations of word structure, which decide the metrics of its poetry. The laws of prosody are not imposed on a language”. Nuaimah has expressed in another article that ‘neither metres nor rhymes are necessary for poetry’, while contradicting his own statement in another piece of writing claiming that ‘metre is necessary but rhyme is not’. Nuaimah’s ‘verse shows an ear sensitive to music in poetry and a good grasp of metre : and in his attempt to define metre he rightly says that the primary aim of metre is to achieve harmony and balance in the expression of emotion and thought’ but his contribution to criticism in literature is based on the ‘literary criteria, in his opinion ,which are permanent because they depend on permanent human needs. These needs are primarily four : our need to express our feelings and ideas, our need for guiding light in life to show us the truth, our need for the beautiful (he is speaking here of absolute truth and beauty), and our need for music. These needs do not vary in their essence with need for music. [121]

Nuaima’s first work Al-Ghirbal  in which he took open revolt against the Qasida and ‘attacks the conventions of eloquence and poetry of style, which the ancient poets as well as the first generation of Al-Nahda had considered prerequisites to any poetic composition’. In his book , he clears that ‘poetry should be meaningful and relate to the spiritual and emotional needs of man and satisfy his longing for beauty and music’. He also explains poet to be ‘a prophet ,a philosopher , a painter ,a musician and a priest in one’, and hence called stagnant Arabic Poetry  as ‘the Arabic type of rhyme , which is still dominant, is nothing but an iron chain by which we tie down the winds of our poets, and its breaking is long overdue’. Nuaimah was free from bondage of traditional limits of Arabic literature from his early life and therefore he wanted others to be liberated and this brought forward his unique style, as critics put it, ‘Nuaima’s touch is soft, musical and light, almost like a faint whiff of air with nothing hard or grating. His poems move from tune to tune and rhythm to rhythm all in calmness’. [122]

In his another work Al-Khiar wal Sharr ( good and Evil), ‘Nuaimah believes in the immortality of the soul after its liberation from the body. Birth and death are two chains in the never ending chain of life’ and his Auraq al-Kharif (Autumn Leaves), ‘symbolises the different stages of man’s life up to the hour of death’ and autumn leaves for the writer symbolises the concept of belonging to nature as ‘autumn leaves to return to the Earth’s fold’. As all his poems deliberate his greatness in being ‘content to life’ ,no doubt , advocating the goodness and thereby accepting the sorrows and bitterness of life ‘but finds compensations’. ‘Nuaima’s realism is robust ; death follow life but in a continuing chain’ and in this way he shows his depth of imagination and intensity of his thought and understanding of life and ‘portray the greatness of this simple man’.[123]

Nuaimah represented himself as ‘an Arab listening post overseas for Arab talent everywhere; Egypt, the South Mahjar, Syria and the North Mahjar’[124]. He believed that “no Critic was capable of distinguishing absolute beauty, truth and goodness in a work of literature, for each critic has his own personal criteria”[125].

            Mikhial Nuaimah  ‘was the main person whose personal guidance and example played an important role in literary growth of many members of al-Rabita, taking them to the level of manifestation of the association, these members include Rashid Ayyub, Abu Madi and Nudra Haddad’. He also was having a closeness towards the Freemasonary( who believed that we belong to nature and to nature we have to return) and like many other Arab intellectuals , he too was attracted by ‘Masonic principles’ like “mutual tolerance, unfettered liberty of conscience, and human brotherhood, and the watchword of ‘Liberty, Equality and Fraternity”. Once he became Mason in New York and his work and devotion to it , he was prompted to the degree of a Master Mason.  He is also the only mahjar poet of whom we know most, of his life, and educational background and of the influence upon him of foreign literature and philosophical ideas’. The two works which acted as a mirrior of his life are his biography of Jibran and his own three-volume autoniography ,Sab’un (seventy)(Beirut 1959). Counting the work Hams al-Jufun, critics opine that “Mikhail Naimy’s anthology Hams al-Jufun contains forty-four poems ; twenty-three are in strophic form, ranging from couplet to stanzas of seventeen hemi-stichs. Only one poem, Ya Rafiqi, consists of irregular stanzas”. He is believed to have been “following the labenese Christian tradition in using strophic verse, and was encouraged or inspired by the liberal attitude of Protestant hymnody towards the rigid rules of Arabic prosody”.[126]

Ilya Abu Madi

Ilya Abu Madi is ‘perhaps the gretest poet of hte Pen association. Unlike Nuaima, Abu Madi (1889-1957) did not have the advantage of a regular or systematic education’. Ilya Abu Madi was born in Lebanon about 1889, later he ‘moved to Egypt in 1900’ and there he worked in one of the Tobacco company in Alexandria until 1911 and this was the year in which he published his ‘first volume of verse’. Then , he immigrated to United States and there he ‘engaged in business for some time, but later devoted himself to poetry and journalism’.[127] He was brought up in a family hit by poverty as Ismat Mahdi puts it , “there was little promise that Ilya Abu Madi, born as he was in the remote Lebanese village of Al-Mahaidussa, would grow up to become the most popular poet of Mahjar. He was only eleven when he had to leave school and earn his living. This he did by going to Alexandria where he started business as a tobacconist”. It was in Alexendria, which was atourist centre and was also famous for its learning and education. Abu Madi took full advantage of the situation and in his free-time, he worked on Arabic languge and this directly influenced his producing literary verse. He worked with very hard toil and efforts in his daily life and having literary quest managed to publish his first Diwan Tadhkira al-Madi (Rememberance of Past), in 1911.[128] Ilya Abu Madi is the most famous poet of ‘Al-Rabita’ and the most widely read among all the expatriate poets in the America. He is the one who introduced important changes and innovations in the Arabic poem. His poetry has been termed as the beginning of madern verse and also as ‘the start of a period’. Ilya Abu Madi began his poetic career, which was to last long, early in life, by his first collection, as mentioned, Tadhkira al-Madi . ‘this Diwan, betrays traditional poetic education’ and ‘its poetry shows a strong poetic talent, a sharp memory and a great capacity for stringing together words and rhymes’.[129] ‘Abu Madi is one of the most interesting poets in modern Arabic, for he arrived at a high degree of modernity without ever becoming divorced from traditional roots’. Madi immigrated in 1911 to America from Egypt and shifted to New York in1916, where all other members of Al-Rabita had already been, ‘with the exception of Nuaima’.  Nuaimah had a marked effect on Ilya Madi as he come close to him and ‘Abu Madi fell under his influence’, and hence achieved perfection together with the influence of Jibran Khalil Jibran. His second Diwan Diwan Ilya Abu Madi came to light in 1919, the preface of which was written by Jibran himself, reflects the effect of these two great personalities on Ilya Abu Madi. His approach became rebellious against ‘fossilization and traditionalism’ after his understanding of the articles written by Nuaimah in Al-Funun  and al-Sa’ih and created in him a great change and shaped in him ‘poetic sensiblity’. After this period and change ,his two works earned him a great fame in literary circles and these poems are Al-Nahr al-Mutajmmid and  Akhi. Abu Madi reached the height of his poetic talent when his third ‘and best’ volume appeared in 1927( 1925 as per-Badawi p-189), the preface of which was forwarded by Nuaimah and before this his another poem ahd already marked the Arab world Al-Masa published in 1921 in Majmu’at al-Rabita al-Qalamiyya. His early and latter poems are quite different from the perspective of their fluidity of style, the gentle melancholy, and the soft musical tones which show highness in his latter poetry. Al-Jadawil was the best work of Ilya Abu Madi, Nuaimah while writing its preface hailed the ‘great change’ in him. In this work, change was felt in both form and content and hence it ‘gave evidence of superior and highly adaptable talent,which concealed, to a great extant, the novelty of Abu Madi’s conversion’. This work is always the representation of his works , whenever critics ‘discuss the attributes or influence of Abu Madi’.       

 During this period he worked as a journalist and with his experiences managed to edit several newspapers, which enabled him to start a fortnightly review Al-Samir in1929, later this was converted to daily newspaper and in this way became one of the leading North American Mahjar newspaper. This newspaper, which was established in New York, became one of the most successful of such periodicals in America. It was turned into a daily in 1936 and he continued to edit it until his death in 1957.[130] [131]  In his life the last volume was published entitled The Thickets in 1940 and another volume Gold and Dust was published posthumously.[132] In UNESCO Conference held in Beirut, 1949 ,Ilya Abu Madi represented the journalists of Mahjar and it was time when he had become a celebrity not only in Mahjar but all over the Arab World.[133]

Juyyusi giving details of later verses write,  “the appearance of Al-Khama’il in 1940 showed that the poet’s modern sensibility was not deep enough to last him a lifetime”. His poems were steeped in “traditionalism, abounding with stock images and stock emotions and following traditional patterens of form.” The poems in Al-Khama’il are monorhymed and shapeless, where he has not paid attention to “real unity or organic growth”. Comparing it with Al-Jaadawil Juyyusi writes, “whereas in Jadawil he sought to interpret his ideas in suggestive, often oblique methods by resorting to allegory, pictorial images or narrative, here, in most poems, he resorts to the traditional poetic method of using the direct and flat one verse epigram. A good example of this is his poem Kun Balsaman, whose very title betrays the didactic attitude. The poem starts by giving advice upon advice to the reader (or listener) to love, arguing the importance of loving. It is a completely mental exercise, totally lacking in passion”.[134]

            Ismat Mahdi giving reflection of influence of Al-Ma’arri and Abu Nuwas on him writes, “The abbasid poets ,al-Ma’arri  and Abu Nuwas, were his early guiding lights. Abu Madi was influenced by the scepticism of al-Ma’arri and the changing mood of Abu Nuwas from from pessimism to optimism”.[135]

Abu madi returned to traditional themes, moods,structures etc., which is reflected in his book which got published posthumously in 1960 Tibr wa Turab (Gold and Dust), in Beirut. “In it , Abu Madi’s relapse traditional themes, moods, structures and attitudes is immediately apparent”, while as a good part “ Tibr wa Turab, moreover , is made up of poems of occasion, which is indeed a sad relapse”. But counting the merits of Abu Madi critics write, “It was intelligence and a great poetic power that gave an authentic tone to his experiment with these new ideas, basically foreign to him, especially the idea of the Forest and the trend towards Nature, both adopted from Gibran and Nuaima. It is seemingly innocent and Romantic Abu Madi who believes that love permeates Nature and that it is possible to achieve joy and happiness by being in harmony with Nature”.[136]Ilya Abu Madi’s poetic output is collected in five volumes of which three were published in the United States and the last appeared shortly after his death in Beirut. They are, in their order as;-“Tadhkar al-Madi(1911), Diwan Ilya Abu Madi(1919), al-Jadawil(Brookes,1925), AL-Khama’il(Thickets,1940), and Tibr wa Turab (Gold and Earth)”, Abu Madi’s verse ishaving touch of imagery and resorts to metaphors “when he wishes to create an atmosphere where the imaginative style is more effective than a factual one”.[137]

            The speciality of Ilya Abu Madi in Mahjar literature was that he was having ‘good ground in grammar and prosody’[138], which was the result of his stay and learning in Alexandria which credited him ‘with a more thorough grasp of the rules of poetry than any Mahjar, as puts Badawi, “this , in part, is due to his having spent his formative years in Egypt, where the forces of conservatism at the time, much stronger than in the Lebanon, curbed the extremism of authors and made for a generally more moderate attitude”.[139]

           

Amin-u-Rihani

There are other immigrant literary personalities who did not merge with the Al-Rabitah League or Andulusia League but kept their separate identity in the Mahjar literature, which include poet Ma’sood Samahah, Na’oom Makarzil, Ameen Mashriq, Ne’amatul Haaj and above all Amin-u-Rihani. Aminu Rihani did not join the AL-Rabitah al-Qalamiyyah  because at the time of its formal establishment in 1920, he was not present in New York, though he was a main person behind its idea in 1916, as pointed by Paul Starkey, “ Nuaimah was unofficially involved with Arrabitah, before its formation in 1920”. No doubt, he preferred to “Stay away from Arrabitah he nevertheless provided inspiration for the enlargement of its literary horizens’.

Amin-u-Rihani (1876-1940), the most eminent writer of Mahjar, who coined name particularly in prose was ‘most widely travelled writer of his generation’. He was in front leading , ‘who sought to carry the message of Eastern values to the West’ and thereby wanted to carry ‘the progress of the West to the East’. His writings ‘were the first to rouse the consciousness among émigrés to social problems and showed ways of reforming them’. He became forerunner in being a messenger ‘for peaceful co-existence of creeds and people’. He was against ‘religious fanaticism’ and ‘a spirit of tolerance pervades his work’. Rihani , was born in one of the regions of Lebanon called Frayka in 1876 and immigrated to New York at the tender age of just twelve years. He was always occupied with the thoughts of his homeland, as he ‘kept thinking of the fresh air and clear skies of Frayka, and was never polluted by industrialisation’ according to George Saydah.

Jibran and Rihani, were the first two rebels in Arabic literature who reflected , not only the aggressions inflicted by the outer world, but also the stupor, the fetters, the inertia, the fanaticism, the ignorance and stagnation of their  own people.

Rihani contributed to the literature as paralleled only by Jibran and Nuaimah and the best books of Riahni include Muluk-al-Arab (Arab Kings, two volumes) Qalb al-Iraq (The Heart of Iraq),  Al-Rihaniyyat (Collections of essays in four volumes). Al-Rihani is among the three best , who wrote on poetry and art besides Nuaimah and Gibran, propounding a new avant-garde conception of poetry. He is regarded as the first who’s attempted at a poetic attitude in imagination conveyed in prose and at prose poetry, next in line is Jibran. It was with the efforts of Rihani and Jibran that possibility of a poem written in prose was introduced into the Mahjar literature. This man is defined to be having ‘keen intuition, a well-guided talent, a basically different outlook coloured by a persistent foreign cultural influence’ and resulting into a most creative person in Mahajr besides Jibran. Rihani’s name was first which shone in North America, who was a writer, orator and preacher of Arab unity. His contribution to Modern Arabic literature is unparalleled but the critics opine that in four ways he contributed to modern Arabic literature, as he acted as impetus to the younger immigrants in their literary activities. He was the source who introduced Romantic trend in Arabic literature. Thirdly, he was the first who revolted against outmoded ways in Arabic literature, particularly poetry and lastly, he is known as the first who deliberately attempted in writing the prose-poetry in Arabic, coined a name for him as “Father of Prose Poetry” in Arabia. His famous book Al-Rihaniyyat is the collection of his many speeches and articles written in Arabic, which demands the unity of his countrymen, freedom and progress and arts for modern techniques, must be felt and welcomed by his countrymen.

Comparing him with the Jibran’s wanderings in the realm of soul and his escapism to the Nature, Rihani is regarded to be a realistic also for ‘his down to earth talk about aims and objectives, his call for science, progress and technology, portray him as the practical reformer, while his love for freedom, his revolutionary attitude towards literature, language and art, his love for nature and simplicity regard him as the Romantic figure.

He started his career with the translation of al-Ma’ari’s Luzumiyyat in 1903, and then continued his passion for literature upto 1916, when he with other Northern Mahjar writers tried to form a literary association but the indifference in friendship of Rihani and Jibran, who had met in 1911 in Paris, could not let the programme matured , which was the result that Al-Rabitah’s idea of establishment goes back to the date 1916 and its formal establishment takes place in 1920, when al-Rihani had already taken a career as a leading missionary of Arab unity.

           Amin-ul-Rihani (1876-1940) , the most eminent writer in mhajar, who coined name particularly in Prose was ‘most widely travelled writer of his generation’. He was in front leading the Mahjar writers , ‘who sought to carry the message of Eastern values to the West’ and thereby wanted to carry ‘the progress of the West to the East’. His writings were the first to rouse the consciousness among émigrés to social problems and showed ways of reforming them. He became forerunner in being a messenger ‘for peaceful coexistence of creeds and peoples’. He was against ‘religious fanaticism’, term used by Ismat Mahdi, and ‘A spirit of tolerance pervades his work.[140]

CHAPTER 2 : Section -1.

Symbolism was a late nineteenth century art movement of French and Belgain origin in poetry and it basically originated in Francce and it is the movement in which art became infused with mysticism.[141]“Symbolism was introduced by the French poets Paul Verlaine (1844-1896), Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891), and Stephane Mallarme (1842-1898) in the lost quarter of the century”.[142] In France , Symbolism as a movement in poetry began in the latter half of the nineteenth century and it was not a sudden result, but ‘was the result of a sophisticated cultural , Social and artistic development over the years. On social grounds, its philosophy eloberated as ‘a protest against the bourgeois spirit of the nineteenth century’,the ‘bourgeois worship of activity and success as reflected by positivism and materialism’.[143]

French symbolism was both a continuation of the Roamntic tradition and reaction to the realistic approach of impressionism. In literature , symbolism was an aesthetic movement that encouraged writers to espress their ideas, feelings and values by means of symbols or suggestions rather than by direct statements. Symbolists believed that, “the use of mythology and symbols in modern poetry is essential, because the modern world is a world without poetry, a world which extols the material above the spiritual. It is difficult to convey such a reality without descending to the level of prose. Symbols and legends save the poet from direct statement and add freshness to his poetry. Symbolist writers, in reaction to early 19^th century trends (Romanticism of novelists such as Victor Hugo, the realism and naturalism of Gustave Flaubert and Emile Zola), proclaimed that the imagination was the true interpreter of reality. They also discarded rigid rules of versification and the stereotyped poetic images of their predeceddors, the so-called Parnassians, important precursors of Symbolist poetry were the American writer ‘Edgar Allan Poe’ and French poet ‘Gerard de Nerval’.

Symbolism was largely a reaction against Naturalism, Realism, Impressionism and Anti-idealistic movements, which attempted to capture reality in its gritty particularity, and to elevate the humble and the ordinary over the ideal. These movements, therefore invited a reaction in favour of spirituality, the imagination and dreams and hence the path to symbolism begins with the reaction. Therefore, it is clear that the Naturalism and Realism lack the power of quenching the thirst of soul and spirituality and put the stress on the material and solidity while as people throng to support the new movement, so that hope of imagination and dreams, which is directly related to symbolic or inner language reflecting the faces of imagination and spiritual feelings. It attracted many writers, like Joris Karl Huysmans, who began as naturalist before moving in the direction of symbolism. For Huysmans, this change reflected his awakening interest in religion, mythology and spirituality. Therefore, the movement, where the spiritual imagination was having the highest authority, intensity, concentration, richness, musical suggestiveness, evocativeness, and these were the qualities especially valued by the symbolists and those who they influenced. From their point of view any image , any figure of speech, any literary or mythological or historical allusion, any turn of speech even maybe symbolic, carrying us towards a mystical realization beyond immediate experience. Symbolism movement is having significant influence on Expressionism and Surrealism, the two movements which descend directly from Symbolism proper.

So far as literary origin of this movement is concerned, the symbolist movement had its beginning in the poetry of Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867)[144], in his sonnet “Correspondence” and whose “Les Fleurs du mal” (Flowers of Evil,1857) and “Le spleen de Paris”(1869) were judged as the precursor of Symbolsim.[145]

Juyyusi  writes in brief description about the concept of the sonnet Correspondence of Baudelaire with reference to Henri Pyre:-

“Yeats presents a lucid interpretation of the soncept of this sonnet, without referring to it: “All sounds, all colours, all forms, either because of their pre-ordained energies or because of long association, evoke indefinable and yet precise emotions...when sound, and colour, and form are in a musical relation... they become as it were one sound, one colour, one form and evoke an emotion that is made out of their distinct evocations and yet is one emotion.....All arts are parallel translations of one fundamental mystery. Senses correspond to each other; a sound can be translated through a perfume and a perfume through a vision; each wovel suggests a colour”.[146]

French symbolism to the greater extant was a stress on the proper regard and value for ‘the sounds of poetry’[147], through their artistic skill brought forward meanings which were obscure but suggestive from many adjectives and nouns.[148]

Later on, Stephane Mallarme’s literary saloon and poetry, such as “L’apres-midi d’un faune”(The Afternoon of a faun, 1876), carried on the movement. Mallarme’s prose studies Divagations (Rimblings,1897) formed one of the most important three works of poetry which are chiefly associated with the movement are Paul Verlaine’s “Romances sans paroles (Songs without words,1874) and Arthur Rimbaud’s “Le Bateau ivre” ( The Drrunken Boat, 1871) and “Une Saison en enfer”( A Season in hell, 1873). The aesthetics of the symbolist movement, no doubt, traces were shown in Charles Baudelaire nut it got developed by Stephane Mallarme and Paul Verlaine during 1860’s and 70’s.In 1880’s, the aesthetic was articulated through a series of manifestoes and in this way attracted a generation of writers. It is clear that it was in West with the central aim of the symbolists which was rooted first and foremost in Mallarme’s notion that “poetry should not inform but suggest and evoke”[149]. The symbolists proclaimed authenticity of “intuitive perception and non-rational over intellectual and scientific knowledge”.[150]

There was much admiration and attraction for Baudelaire in the works of the writer Edger Allan Poe, which Baudelaire greatly admired and translated into French which created significant influence and the source of many stock tropes and images. Symbolism movement has had a marked influence, through the time, on the modern poets of many countries. The epochs of the symbolism Baudelaire, Verlaine, Mallarme and others, feeling that modern utilitarianism and science-mindedness were alien to the traditions and aim of art, therefore they sought to create a verse which could rise “through scent, colour and sound to raptures of the spirit”. They believed in only expressing “Evanescent perceptions of the senses”, and dim emotions which are “the subjective, the fluid elements of the mind”.[151] They called it vain to explain an unknowable world in an exact representation, as per the scope of Realism as they wanted poetry to “appeal secret desires and excitements”[152], and preffered the suggestive metaphors and fluid melody to express poet’s inner vision.[153]The essence of this movement is in its insistence on a world of ideal beauty and its conviction that is realized through art. The ecstasies which religion claims for the devout through prayer and contemplation are claimed by the Symbolist for the poet through the exercise of his craft.

The critics believe that ‘the Romantic movement in European literature has been since its inception an ever-widening continuum”, Abu-Haider Jareer convey’s while giving the reference of Edmund Wilson “...describes symbolism, and quite rightly so, as being ‘a second flood of the same tide’, a second flood of Romantisicm”. Giving further detail, he says. “If the Romanticists have enjoined suggestion rather than state them plainly was...one of the primary aims of the Symbolists, Mallarme, the acknowledged prophet of symbolism likewise decrees: ‘Paint, not the thing itself, but the effect that it produces’ (peindre non la chose, mais l’effect qu’elle produit)”[154].

Symbolism in literature was having its particular identity while as in the art, symbolism represents an outgrowth of the darker, gothic side of Romanticism. The spirit of Romanticism was impetuous and rebellious and the symbolist art was static and hieratic. Symbolism , wshich also found expression in painting and in thr threatre, in Europe reached itshigh point in the 1890’s, it is cahracterised by a desire to liberate poetry from convention through devices such as the complex use of often highly personalised metaphor, and synaesthesia (the expression of one sense impression in terms of another)[155]

The symbolist manifesto was published by Jean Moreas on 18^th September 1886 as Le Symbolisme-le Figaro. In this , Moreas claimed that the symbolism does not support the plain meanings as he announced that symbolism was hostile to declamations, false sentimentality and matter-of-fact description, therefore he explained that the real purpose and aim of the symbolism is to ‘clothe the ideal in a perceptible form’, which clears, whose goal was not in itself, but whose sole purpose was to express the ideal, which means that what-so-ever was used as symbolism is not goal in but is a medium and purpose to express the inner thought , imagination, language of soul or ideal. He explained that in this art, scenes from nature, human activities and all other real world phenomena will not be described for their own sake, here they are perceptible surfaces created to represent their esoteric affinities with the primordial ideals. The first symbolist exhibition was organised by Guaguin in 1889-90 at the Paris World’s fair.

Symbolists were of opinion that absolute truths are the real things worth of aiming and capturing therefore they preferred that absolute truth cannot be captures directly but could be only accessed by indirect methods. Therefore, they wrote in a highly metaphorical and suggestive manner, by endowing particular images or objects with symbolic meaning. These images or objects with symbolic values were believed to be the real communicators of inner feelings, which can be translated by the listeners or readers.[156]

Symbolism was a revolutionary movement in the poetry because the symbolist poets were of opinion that techniques of versification or the principles of poetry as per the techniques are a hurdle between the thought and writing-matter communication. Therefore, these poets wished to liberate techniques of versification so as to allow greater room and place for ‘fluidity’ or flow of emotional imagination into the verses, that is how they aligned with the movement towards free verse,a revolutionary change in the traditional value of poems of Gustave Kahn and Ezra Pound.

Symbolist poems were aimed to evoke feeling in listeners and readers rather to describe them the poets state of soul. In other words symbolist poems were a direct communication in terms of soul relations with the evocative power in the target and no stress was given to describe the state of soul and hence description was less target than evocation. if it happens, at times, that there existed description, it was produced by consequences but the real target and aim of symbolists poems was to signify and activate the state of the poet’s soul in the target and hence, symbolic imagery was used to evoke the real soul in poems.

Poets of symbolism stressed the need to identity and confound the separate senses of scent, and colour, hence, synesthesia was a prized experience. This is also evident in the poem of Charles Baudelaire’s Correspondences, which also speaks of ‘foressts of Symbols’(forests de symbols);-

            These are perfumes that are fresh

            Like children’s flesh,

            Sweet like oboes, green like meadows,

            And others, corrupt, rich and

            Triumphant,

            Having the expansiveness of infinite

            Things, like amber, muse, benzuin

            And incense,

            Which sing the raptures of the soul

            And senses.

The essence of symbolism was not fully defined and expressed until it appeared in the Paul Verlaine’s series of essays on Staphane Mallarme, Triston Corbiere and Arthur Rimbaud in 1884,which were called by him as the ‘accused poets’ or commonly termed as ‘Poetes Maudits’. This term was borrowed by Verlaine from Baudelaire’s opening poem Benediciton from his collection les fluers du mal in which Baudelaire describes a poet whose inner strength is not shaken or disturbed by the contempt of the people surrounding him.

            Verlaine claims that these poets were different and isolated from their other contemporaries because of their individuality, who have been neglected because of ‘genius a curse’, having their own ways , as they were not at all concerned to avoid Hermeticism and idiosyncratic writing styles. This concept of genius and the role of the poet was a philosophy of pessimists, Arthur Schopenhauer, who claimed the purpose of art was to provide a temporary refuge from the world of blind strife of the will.

They deliberately altered or upset the usual sequence of words and also avoided rhetorical development. Critics claim two main drawbacks of the symbolists as its “severance from ordinary life and then the enormous importance it attached to music”. Juyyusi giving reference to Pyre says, “Symbolists were lost in the clouds of rarefied atmosphere”.[157]

CHAPTER-2: SYMBOLISM AND SYMBOL

SEC 1-(b)     SYMBOL

Symbols are essentially words which are not merely connotations, but also evocative and emotive. In addition to their meaning, they also call up or evoke before the mind’s eye host of associations connected with them, and are also rich inn emotional significance. For example, the word ‘lily’ merely connotes a ‘flower’, but it also evokes images of beauty and innocence. it also carries with it the emotional overtone of pity, resulting from suffering or oppression. In this way, through symbols a writer can express much more than by the use of ordinary words. Symbols make the language rich and expressive. Concepts, which by their very nature are inexpressible, can be conveyed in this way. Thus a symbol can be used to convey ‘pure sensation’, or the poet’s apprehension of transcendental mystery. Use of symbols is essentially an oblique or indirect mode of expression which suggests much more than is actually described or asserted. It deals with the infinite and the absolute and express the spiritual and the abstract through the physical and the concrete. Use of symbols is an oblique mode of saying things.

Symbols are usually of two kinds          (1) Traditional and (2) Personal.

            Traditional symbols are stock symbols which have been in general use. For example, ‘rose’ is a traditional symbol of beauty and has been used by poets from the earliest times. As most readers are familiar with such stock symbols, their uses increase the evocative pleasure of poetry without introducing any element of complexity or obscurity. Personal symbols, on the other hand, are devised by the poet for his own purposes, to express the vague fleeting impressions passing through his mind, or to convey his own sense of the mystery of life. They express the poet’s experiences, often mystical in nature. As the readers are not familiar with such symbols, they create difficulties for them, though at the same time they enhance the richness of the language.

            A symbol is something that represents something else by convention, habit, resemblance or association. Symbols in literature have specific referents.

            The word ‘symbol’ is derived from the Greek word ‘symbolaeon’ and was originally political and not literary. Symbaleaon described a group of words that made up a treaty or a contract. The problem was that each of the contractees attached different ideas to the words they agreed to approve. In as much as, the symbols a writer uses may mean different things to different people, the problem of understanding symbols still exists. D.H. Lawrence conveys them as the organic units of consciousness with a life of their own and you can never explain them away, because their value is dynamic, emotional , belonging to the sense-consciuosness of the body and soul and not simply mental. While as A.N.D. has suggested that ‘poem itself is a living image’’ as an allegorical image has a meaning. Now we can simplify the definition to combine all its crux that ‘ the use of symbols can be defined as the representation of a reality on one level of reference by a corresponding reality on another. Ploto writes that ‘ it is easier to say what a thing is like than what it is’, so we think of someone of ‘running like the wind’ which means very fast. Also, at times, when the major symbol of a story may be found in the title, which may also supply the themem. We recoginise symbolos by the position of importance they hold in a story, and by their frequent recurrence, either in the narrative or in dialogue. The author compels on stress the need for the reader to understand the symbols which the writer uses , because they are at times, the clue to under-standing the story itself.

            Everybody is aware, even a common man, about understanding of certain common symbols like rainbows, day-break,a cross, aflag and others, but the fact remains that symbols are drawn from nearly every feild of human endeavour and have come into literary use from many sources and at different times. The lotus flower, for example may symbolize perfect form or ‘the state of being perfect’ to Asian reader but it is not necessary to carry same meaning to the Europeon or African, for some of them it symbolize an axe.

SEC-2 ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF SYMBOLISM IN  ENGLISH LITERATURE

SEC-3 ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF SYMBOLISM INMODERN ARABIC LITERATURE.

The development of Romanticism in Arabic literary world paved a way for symbolism. As the Romanticism was evidently originated in the Lebanon in the whole Arabic speaking world, because Syria and Lebanon had been more open towards the Western literature and culture than any other Arab state. No doubt, the symbolism, as a movement made itself felt at the later years, but ‘the symbolist trend in Lebanon began simultaneously with that of Romanticism’.[158] The cause for symbolism ,as a movement to be delayed lies in the fact that ‘Romantic movement in modern Arabic poetry was a natural development’ which as the causes of symbolism as a movement in West was gradual and natural development which was not the case with symbolism in Arabic literature because the initiation of Symbolic trend was a forced and thrust upon phenomenon in modern Arabic literarture. Critics convey that the symbolism is  the next step in sequence to Romanticism, ‘the Romantic movement in Europeon literature has been since its inception an ever-widening continuum’ , the movement of symbolism is ‘a second flood of the same tide’, a second flood of Romaniticism’. Further scholars confirm that ‘ if the Romanticists have enjoined suggestion rather than statement in  what we write,to intimate things rather than state them plainly was...one of the primary aims of the symbolists, Mallarme, the acknowledged prophet of symbolism, likewise decrees : ‘paint , not the thing itself, but the effect that it produces’ (Peindre non la chose, mais l’effect qu’elle produit)’.[159]

On comparing movement of symbolism in East with the West, we observe that symbolism in France, ‘as a movement in poetry began in the later half of nineteenth century and was the result of a sophisticated cultural, social and artistic development over the years’. It developed as a protest against the Bourgeois spirit of the nineteenth century, against positivism, materialism and scientific Realism. The aim of Symbolism was to purify the state of poetry and hence ‘it linked up with Romanticism which had receded, but not died’, and which had ‘prefigured symbolism and opened the way for it’.[160] The Arabic symbolism, on the other hand, was not having any sort of such development behind it, as it did not ‘stem from any artistic and social causes’, and also symbolism in modern Arabic poetry was not a reaction to the ‘sentimentality and banality of the Roamantic movement’,[161] as the Romantic waves were not yet established itself in the perfect shape. The two movements in Arabic evolved to their acme at the same time contrary to the Western way of development of these movements. The writers Ilya Abu Shabaka and Sa’id Aql produced their best works at the same time as the former was the greatest poet in modern Arabic literature and the latter was the greatest symbolist poet in the Arab World. In modern Arabic poetry, ‘Romanticism would seem to bear in it the seeds of Symbolism are to be seen in the Romantic poetry of Gibran and other Mahajr poets, as well as in such poets as Al-Shabbi and al-Hamshari’, Juyyusi puts it, ‘and in semi-symbolic poets like Amin Nakhla and Yusuf Ghusub, a fact which might mislead critics into believing that symbolism in Arabic , like the French movement, had been prefigured by Romanticism’. As the critics believe that the symbolisms streaks were felt at the same time, when Romanticism was establishing itself as a movement, therefore it makes a clear point that symbolism had not been the next of Romanticism in Modern Arabic Literature as Juyyuis puts it, ‘In fact, the Romantics who best showed symbolic streakes, with the exception of Gibran and other Mahjar poets, had not yet risen to real fame in the Arab world’, hence ‘it seems then the symbolism in Modern Arabic poetry was not prefigured by ROmaniticism, but stemmed from other sources’. Here it makes a point that Lebanese poets who had been educated with Western ideas and methods and were culturally ‘urbanised and sophisticated’ and therefore they were, to some extent, capable of ‘assimilating the highly sophisticated concepts of nineteenth century symbolism’.[162]

            The multicultural and multilingual aspects of Arab poets paved for them to work simultaneously on both the movements, as Romanticism evolving at home and symbolism developing in Western literature as ‘ Another important representative of Romanticism in Lebanon, Salah Labaki (1916-55), originally born in Brazil but brought up in Lebanon, combined ‘Romanitc with Symbolist influences’ in his five collections of poetry’. The rise of symbolism in modern Arabic poetry is a less easily explicable phenomenon than the rise of Romanticism’ and also the symbolism’s rise in Europe cannot be paralleled to its rise in Arabic literature, from the point of their origination and hence writes Paul Starkey:-

            “The  two movements are clearly connected, and the symbolist elements-with their emphasis on musicality, suggestiveness and beauty for its own sake- are apparent in a number of pets..... who are almost without exception classified as ‘Romantics’, including the Mahjar writer Jubran, the Tunisian al-Shabbi and Egyptian al-Hamshari” and “The symbolist techniques were introduced”, without naming themselves symbolist movement, “appears to be primarily a Lebanese phenomenon”.[163]

Giving details of the Lebanese symbolism Ismat Mahdi writes, “Sa’id Aql(1912) is the foremost Lebanese symbolist, other famous poets include Yusuf al-Khal, Khalil Hawi, Badr Shakir al-Sayyab and Adunis”[164]. But starkey confirms that “the first mature symbolist poetry as such in Arabic being usually creditied to Adib Mazhar (1898-1928)”, who after being influenced by the poetry of Baudelaire and Pierre Saman, “began composing symbolist poems in Arabic in the 1920’s: his poems-the first of which, Nahid al-Sukun, is often counted the first symbolist poem in Arabic-clearly show an acquaintance with the work of Baudelaire”. Adib Mazhar’s sudden death brought an end to his symbolist career but the way was continued by a number of other poets, including Yusuf Ghusub (1893-1971) and Sa’id Aql (1912-).[165] On the other hand Badawi confirms that “first major symbolist poet, that we find Arabic Arabic symbolist poetry of a very high order” is Adunis (Ali Ahmad Sa’id’s (1930) poetry “The Frontiers of Despair” not in the works of “Bishr Faris (d.!963) or even of Said Aql, who is generally regarded as the first major symbolist poet”.[166] Here it is important to give the views of John A. Haywood about the streaks of symbolism in Arabic literature, as he writes , “Jibran was a rebel and an individualist.....various influences seem to coalesce into a thoroughly integrated personality, For them he represents the liberated human spirit, and one of the first Arab symbolists. He is , indeed , a latter-day mystic.... he uses delicate similes and metaphors, and shows psychological insight in delineating charater. He is also a realist..... Both the contemplation and personal experience of suffering in some way uplifted him. Some would call it morbidity”. He continues writing about Jibran being the symbolist , conveys, “In Sarakh al-Qubur (The Shout of Graves) the symbolism is clear.... the whole story is symbolical legend.....but Jibran is more successful when his symbolism is more subtle”.[167]

---

[1] Sarrraj,Nadirah Jameel.Shu’ara-ul-Rabitat-l’Qalamiyyah, Cairo 1957. P-30.

   Al-Has, Saleem, Al-Abhath,1959.p-59.

[2] Qatami, Sameer Badwan, Elyas Farhat, p-57.

[3] Badawi, M.Mustafa,A Critical introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry, Cambridge University press 1975. P-179.

[4] Salma, k.Juyyusi. Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry. E.J.Brill,1977,p-24.vol-I.

[5] S.Moreh, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, E.J.Brill 1976 ,Leiden, the Netherlands.

[6]Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p- 179.

[7] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature, Edinburgh University Press 2006. P-30.

[8] Saydah, George. Adabuna wa Udaba’una fil Mahjir-il-Amerikiyya,Beirut 1964. P-13

[9] Jayyusi, Salma Khadra, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . p-3 (introduction)

[10] QABBISH, AHMAD, Tarikh-us-Shu’ara-ul-Arabi al-hadeth . p-283.

[11] SHOWKET, MEHMOOD HAMID, Maqumat-i-t-Sha’r-il-Arabi-al-Hadeth Wal-Mu’asir . P-193.

[12] ADEEB, WADE’E AMIN, Ash-Sha’rul Arabi fil Mahjar-il-America . p-150.

[13] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-179.

[14] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature, Edinburgh University Press 2006. P- 30-1.

[15] HAYWOOD, JOHN A., Modern Arabic Literature 1800-1970, an introduction with extracts in translation;  LUND HUMPRIES, London 1970. P-26.

[16] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967  , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P-6-7.

[17]  Ibid.

[18] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-30

[19] Ibid, Page31-32

[20] HAYWOOD, JOHN A., Modern Arabic Literature 1800-1970, an introduction with extracts in translation;  LUND HUMPRIES, London 1970. Page-27

[21] HADDARA, MOHAMMAD MUSTAFA, At-Tajdeed fi Sha’r’l-Mahjar ; Cairo 1957. Page 30-31.

[22] QANSAL, ELYAS. Adab-ul-Mugtarbeen . Page-12.

[23] SAYDEH, GEORGE. Adabuna wa Udaba’una fil Mahjar-il-America ; Page31

[24] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-61

[25] MOHAMMAD, ABDUL GHANI HASAN, Al-Shi’r al Arabi fil Mahjar ; Beirut 1957, reffered  by M.M.Badawi in A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-179

[26] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-180.

[27] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P-139.

[28] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-180.

[29] HAYWOOD, JOHN A., Modern Arabic Literature 1800-1970, an introduction with extracts in translation;  LUND HUMPRIES, London 1970. Page-177.

[30] ibid

[31] HADDARA, MOHAMMAD MUSTAFA, At-Tajdeed fi Sha’r’l-Mahjar ; Cairo 1957. Page 61-62.

[32] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-196.

[33] QABBISH, AHMAD, Tarikh-us-Shu’ara-ul-Arabi al-hadeth . p-283 and SAYDEH, GEORGE. Adabuna wa Udaba’una fil Mahjar-il-America ; Page 151,161.

[34] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-61.

[35] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-180.  And   STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-62.

[36] Badawi, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-180.

[37] Ibid., page 181- with reference to  NADIRA JAMEEL,SARRAJ, Shu’ara al-Rabita’al-Qalamiyya .Cairo 1957. Page 69.

[38] Ibid., page 197.

[39] Ibid.,

[40] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 67,68.

[41] SAYDEH, GEORGE. Adabuna wa Udaba’una fil Mahjar-il-America ; Beirut 1964,  3^rd ed., Page 75-76. And JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 69-72.

[42] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 69,72-5.

[43] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P-140.

[44] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 75-6.

[45] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 76.

[46] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P-141.

[47] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 78-80.

[48] BADAWI, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-198.

[49] Ibid 199.

[50] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P-138. With reference to Haywood page 10.

[51] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 140.

[52] BADAWI, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry, Cambridge University Press 1975,p-181.

[53]HADRAH, MOHAMMAD MUSTAFA, Al-Tajdeed fi Sha’r’l Mahjar : Cairo n.d. page 30-1.  and S.Moreh page 73.

[54] HAYWOOD, JOHN A., Modern Arabic Literature 1800-1970, an introduction with extracts in translation;  LUND HUMPRIES, London 1970. Page-177.

[55] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-61-2.

[56] BADAWI, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-181.

[57] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 137.

[58] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 85.

[59] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-62.

[60] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P 84.

[61] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P 85-6.

[62] BADAWI, M.M. A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poet , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-182.

And Jibran Khalil Jibran, al-Majmu’a al-Kamila li Mu’allaqat Jibran Khalil Jibran, (Beirut 1959), pp 278-307.

[63] “The Romantic Movement in European literature has been since its inception an ever-widening continuum, Edimund Wilson describes Symbolism, and quit rightly so, as being a second flood of the same tide, a second flood of Romanticism. If the Romanticism have enjoined suggestion rather than statement in what we write, to imitate things rather than state them plainly was …. one of the primary aims of the Symbolists. Mallarme, the acknowledged prophet of Symbolism, likewise decrees ‘Paint, not the thing itself, but the effect it produces’ “.

….“ Tradition and Modernity in Arabic Language and Literature”, Edited by J.R.SMART; Curzon Press 1996, university of Exeter. Page 3-16.

[64] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P 85.

[65] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 69.

[66] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 68-9.

[67] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-182.

[68] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-64.

[69] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P 84.

[70] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-90.

[71] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P-90.

[72] Ibib., p-105-6.

[73] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.p85-6.

[74] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 138.

[75] DIAF,  SHAWQI. Dirasat fi’l Sh’irl Arabi al Mu’asir ; Dar al-Ma’arif, Cairo 1953. p-247.

[76] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 139. And  JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 71-2.

[77] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 135. And  BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-196.

[78] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P

 91-6.

[79] ABU, MADI, AL-Jadawil ; 3^rd Ed. Beirut 1961. P-9.

[80] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 146.

[81] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 94.

[82] STARKEY, PAUL, Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 63. And  JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 91.

[83] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967  , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 144.

[84] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-181  And MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 144

[85] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 63.

[86] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967  , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 145- with reference to JOSEPHE al HACHIME,etc.,al-Mufid fil Adab al Arabi; part-II, Page 608.

[87] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967  , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 145 and STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 63

[88] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-181.

[89] MIKHAIL, NUAIMAH. Khalil Gibran ; page 133-4.

[90] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-181-2. And STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 63.

[91] MAHDI, ISMAT., Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 145. And BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-182.

[92] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 145-8. And BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-182-3.

[93] M.NUAIMA, Sab’un , 2^nd Ed., Beirut 1964, II .203.

[94] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 94-6.

[95] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 146. And JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 96/92.

[96] CORNELIS, NIJLAND. Representation of the Divine in Arabic Poetry ; Ed. By Gert Borg De Moor. Article” Religious Motifs and Themes in the North American Mahjar Poetry”.

[97] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 98. And MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 144.

[98] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 102. And MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 152-3.

[99]SHAHID, IRFAN, Gibran and the American Literary Canon: the problem of the Prophet- the article which is based on a paper delivered at the Library of Congress Arab American cultural Relations Conference, September 1995 and is published by permission of the Library of Congress, granted on the 23^rd of July,1997. This is present in book Tradition, modernity and post-modernity in Arabic Literature by ISSA J. BOULLATA, KAMAL ABDUL MALEK, Literary criticism 2000. Page 321.

[100]MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P- 153.

[101] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-195.

[102] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P 107

[103] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-196

[104] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-191

[105] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 135.

[106] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 135.

[107] STARKEY, PAUL, Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 63.

[108] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 135-6.

[109] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 137.

[110] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page137.

[111] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-192.

[112] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-193.

[113] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 164.

[114] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 165. And  JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 138.

[115] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P

108.

[116] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 153.

[117] STARKEY, PAUL, Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 64.

[118] STARKEY, PAUL, Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 64.

[119] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 107-8.

[120] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 108. And  BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-182.

[121] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 112-4.

[122] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 153-4.

[123] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 162.

[124] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 115.

[125]  Lecture delivered by Naumah in Arab Literary Conference in Damascus in 1956 entitled ‘Al-Adib wa ‘l-Naqid’.

[126] S.MOREH, Modern Arabic Poetry 1800-1970, LEIDEN,E.J.BRILL,1976.P-

100-115.

[127] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-188-9.

[128] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 162.

[129] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 123.

[130] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 162. And  BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-189.

[131] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 123-5.

[132] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-189.

[133] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 163.

[134] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 125.

[135] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 163.- with reference to AL- JUNDI, ANWAR. AL-Shi’r al-Arabi al-Mu’asir-Tatawwuruhu wa A’lamuhu ,Risala Press,Cairo ,nd. page 305.

[136] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page 125.

[137] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 163.

[138] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press,  1983. P 163

[139] BADAWI, M.M., A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry , Cambridge University Press 1975,p-189.

[140] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967I , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 142, with reference to AL-MAKDISI, ANIS. Al-ittijahat al-Adabiyya fil Alam al Arabi al hadith. Page 285.

[141]  Dr.S’AD ZALLAM,Mazahib-un-Naqd al-Hadithb. First Ed. Pp .

[142] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 172.

[143] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  475.

[144] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  480.

[145] MAHDI, ISMAT, Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967 , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 172

[146] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  480.

[147] C.M.BOWRA, The Heritage of Symbolsim, London , 1943, pp.15.

[148] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  480.

[149] C.M.BOWRA, The Heritage of Symbolsim, London , 1943, pp.3.

[150] HENRI,PEYRE, Symbolsim, Columbia University press, New York, 1947. Refferd  by Juyyusi p-478.

[151] L.F.CAZAMIAN,Essais en deux langues, edited by Henri Didier,Paris 1938, p.189- as referred by S.K.Juyyusi p.478.

[152] C.M.BOWRA, The Heritage of Symbolsim, London , 1943, pp.7-8.

[153] HENRI,PEYRE, Symbolsim, Columbia University press, New York, 1947. Refferd  by Juyyusi p-478.

[154] MALLARME, The Penguin Poets, ed. Anthony Hartley, (reprint 1970), introduction ix.

[155] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature ; Edinburgh University Press Ltd.2006. P 78.( writes in his footnote-30)

[156] Dr.S’AD ZALLAM,Mazahib-un-Naqd al-Hadithb. First Ed. Pp .

[157] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  480.

[158] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  475.

[159] MALLARME,The Penguin Poets, ed. Anthony Hartley (reprint 1970) introd.ix.

[160] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  475-6.

[161] Al-Ramziyya fi’l Shi’r al-Arabi ‘l-Hadith, p-138, as quoted by Juyyusi on page 475-6.

[162] JAYYUSI, SALMA KHADRA, Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, LIEDEN, E.J.BRILL 1977 . Page  476-7.

[163] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature, Edinburgh University Press 2006. P-73.

[164] MAHDI, ISMAT. Modern Arabic Literature 1900-1967I , Da’iratul Ma’arif Press, Osmania University Rabi Publishers, Hyderabad 1983. P 173.

[165] STARKEY, PAUL. Modern Arabic Literature, Edinburgh University Press 2006. P-73.

[166] Badawi, M.Mustafa,A Critical introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry, Cambridge University press 1975. P-236.

[167] HAYWOOD, JOHN A., Modern Arabic Literature 1800-1970, an introduction with extracts in translation;  LUND HUMPRIES, London 1970. P-128-30.