By Baian Rayhanova, Sofia
The intense development of Arabic historical prose in the last decades and
the emergence of various tendencies in contemporary artistic practice have
aroused interest in a range of theoretical issues. Among them is the problem
of the definition of the historical novel as a genre, which has become a vexed
question in the history and theory of literature.
A prominent focus of discussion and reflection in this context is the kind
of novel which has two temporal dimensions (historical and contemporary),
i.e. works dealing with both the recent and the remote past representing a
family chronicle but not including History as such. Mention should also be
made of those allegorical novels in which the past is directly submitted to
the perspective of the present, and many other types.
The topicality of this problem was confirmed at a conference in Cairo in
1998, in which more than 150 Arab novelists and literary critics from vari¬
ous countries took part. One of the hotly debated questions was "the Novel
and History", regarding which the Kuwaiti magazine al-'Arabi published
an article by Abü al-Mu'äti Abü al-Najä. He paid attention to the ideas
put forward by the Moroccan author cAbd al-Fattäh al-Hujmari, who
concerned himself specifically with the problem of the true genre of the his¬
torical novel. It is noteworthy that al-Hujmari's approach is based on the
theoretical definition of the literary genre as a reflection of the experience of
its development, as a generalization of artistic practice. 1 His concept of the
historical novel thus remains essentially within the framework of the tradi¬
tional view. The indisputable characteristic of the historical novel, from his
standpoint, is the recreation of images of real historical figures and events,
which played some role in a concrete period and, as a reflection of this cir¬
cumstance, in the development of the plot of the narration. 2 Nevertheless
the artistic products themselves have shown, as al-Hujmari himself also
* I would like to thank Michael Carter, Hilary Kilpatrick and Sebastian
Günther for their helpful comments, correction and redaction of this paper.
1 The earliest statements on the historical novel were made by the Lebanese authors Salim al-Bustänl and Jurjl Zaydän, who were the virtual creators of this genre in Arabic literature.
2 Abü al-Najä/Abü al-Mu'äti 1998, pp. 105-106.
observed, that not every novel in which real historical persons take part or
well-known events happen can be called a historical novel.
No restriction or definition is absolute: the relativity of the margins
should always be taken into account, as it is always possible that transitional
forms most closely reflect the nature of reality. Therefore the determination
of the basic nature of the genre takes on a special significance, as a genre
represents a complex system of many-sided components at the level of both
plot and form, with these components having to submit to the dominant
property of the genre. In this case, as Yuri Tinianov has emphasized,
"the work is a system of correlative factors. The correlation of the factors by
each other is a function of the work with respect to the whole system. It is
absolutely clear that every literary system is formed not by the peaceful inter¬
action of all factors but by the domination and the prominence of the factor or
group of factors which functionally override and color all the others." 3
Here it is important to recall Mikhail Bakhtin's notion of the chronotope
as having "vital importance" in the study of the historical novel as a genre.
His concept of the correlation of epic and novel as two typologically dis¬
tinct chronotopes enables us to conceptualize more clearly the quality of
the genre which dominates the historical novel. Compared with the epic, as
Bakhtin pointed out, the novel opens "a new area for maximum contact
with the present (with contemporaneity) in its incompleteness." 4
By applying this insight, the appearance of the historical novel among
the various works of Sallm al-Bustänl, Jurji Zaydän and other creators of
the Nahdah ("Renaissance") can be seen as marking the transition of Arabic
literature from the classical type to new forms. At the same time, it means
a change in the chronotope genre: the past and the present enter into direct
contact by penetrating and hence mutually transforming each other.
Thus the Arabic novel moved into new territory, adopting epic material
from the national past which had hitherto been the preoccupation of pre-mod-
ern Arabic literature, most notably in the genres of the sirah 5 as well as the
maqdmah, and these traditions can be followed in all stages of the development
of the Arabic novel, where they are displayed in several variations and forms.
The first Arab novelists, drawing on Arabic historiography, as well as
synthesizing the narrative traditions both of the East and the West, con-
3 Tinianov 1977, p. 227.
4 Bakhtin 1978, p. 445.
5 Some years ago, Betsy Shidfar noticed the variety in the definitions of this genre:
"epic" (Svetozar Pantucek), or "heroic romantic epic" (Isaak Filshtinski), "popular novel" (Nimatula Ibragimov). According to her own definition, "folk novel" should also be noted as well as "popular folk tale" (Roger Allen).
centrated on the "glorious past" in their works because their main aim was
public education. At the same time, they aspired to recreate for their con¬
temporary readers the didactic and useful aspects of historical events in an
attractive artistic form. Sallm al-Bustänl (1848-1884) published the novels
Zanübiyä (1871), Budür (1872), al-Huyäm ft futüh al-Shäm ("Passion dur¬
ing the conquest of Syria", 1874). The other Lebanese author Jamil Nakhlah
al-Mudawwar (1862-1907) represented his work Haddrat al-Isläm fi dar al-
saläm ("The Civilization of Islam in the Abode of Peace", 1888). Following
them, Jurji Zaydän (1861-1914) wrote the series of historical novels which
soon came to enjoy wide popularity in the East, and translations appeared
even in Azerbaijani, besides Persian, Hindi, Turkish and other languages.
Zaydän's success owed much to the fact that "the absolute past" of the epic
was transformed into "the relative past" of the novel, which now depended
on the contemporary attitude and the contemporary author's point of view.
The historical past was depicted through its fluctuation and incompleteness
on analogy to the present. The heroic spirit mixed with the prose of life and
a character became manifest within the diversity of his connection to life,
by his unsteadiness, through the temporal stream. Nevertheless, this artistic
world in its spatial and temporal completeness was created and interpreted as
foreign to the world that was contemporary for the author and reader. The
desire to portray history did not drive out the epic "memory" of the past, nor
did it change the attitude to this past as "the national legend." In the preface
to the novel al-Hajjäj ihn Yusuf (1909), the writer himself declares that
"the popularization of history in the form of the novel is the best way to give
the masses access to reading and enable them to derive benefit from it. We have
even tried to ensure that history always predominates over the novel but not
vice versa. " 6
Like Walter Scott, Jurji Zaydän managed to separate the past from the
present, to compare them. He succeeded not only in portraying the whole
complex of facts and the sequence of events but also in showing the life of
earlier generations as many-sided, saturated with passions and characters.
The author intentionally tried to emphasize the difference of the past from
the present and to make it both inaccessible and yet indispensable for his
contemporaries. For this task, he had to reveal the common human kernel
of the age, "the perpetual" in human relations, and to uncover the various
historical personifications of humanity.
It is significant that Jurji Zaydän began with the representation of the recent
past in two early novels: al-Mamlük al-shärid ("The fugitive Mamluk", 1891)
6 Al-Mar'I 1982 p. 42.
and Istibdäd al-mamälik ("The Mamlüks' tyranny", 1893), which recreated
certain events of the end of the 18 th and the beginning of the 19 th century. By
this means, Zaydän's techniques of the artistic reconstruction of history were
formed in close contact with history itself. After that, these same techniques
were applied to the material of the distant past in other novels depicting the
historical events of the 7 th to the 13 th centuries in chronological succession.
Zaydän's type of novel can be called classical, because historical reality
was portrayed in its "totality" and completeness. It found followers among
his contemporaries from Lebanon, such as Ya'qüb Sarrüf (1852-1927) and
Farah Antün (1874-1922), who lived and wrote in Egypt too, but had al¬
ready played a leading role in the general development of Arabic historical
prose for some years.
Elsewhere in Arabic literature, mention must especially be made of Syr¬
ian writing, in which the genre of the historical novel spread remarkably
widely in the early period of its formation. At the beginning of the 20 th
century 'Abd al-Hamid al-ZahrawI (1871-1916), 'Abd al-Masih al-Antäkl
(1874-1922), Ma'rüf al-Arna üt (1892-1948), 'Ali al-TantäwI (b. 1906), Saläh
al-Dln al-Munajjid (b. 1918) and other Syrian authors applied themselves to
the historical clash between different epochs in their works. Like Zaydän,
they aspired to depict the events of History, as well as of ordinary life by
introducing invented heroes side by side with well-known historical figures
into the plot of the narration. It is this creativity, along with the combination
of educational and entertaining features in their works and their didactic
character, which reveals the extent of their debt to Zaydän's novels.
A similar tendency is visible in modern Egyptian historical prose of the
thirties and the forties, particularly in the works of 'Ali al-Järim (1881-1949),
Ibrahim Ramzl (1884-1949), Muhammad Fand Abü al-Hadid (1893-1967),
'All Ahmad Bäkathlr (1910-1969), 'Abd al-Hamld Jüda al-Sahhär (b. 1913),
'Adil Kämil (b. 1916) and others. The Egyptian scholar Tähä Wädi has ana¬
lyzed some of their works in detail, and concluded that Ibnat al-mamlük
("The Mamluk's Daughter", 1926) and Zanübiyä (1940) by Muhammad Farld
Abü al-Hadld, Bäb al-qamar ("The door of the moon", 1936) by Ibrählm
Ramzl, Marah al-Walid ("Walid's high spirits", 1943) and Sayyidat al-qasr
("The Mistress of the Palace", 1944) by 'Ali al-Järim and Malik min shua ("A
King of Sunbeams," 1945) by 'Adil Kämil are all influenced by the romantic
aesthetics and outlook of Zaydän. 7 The typological closeness of their works
to Zaydän's novels is notable as much in the creation of the plot and composi¬
tion as in the selection of the various artistic means of expression.
7 Wädi 1972, pp. 66-67.
It is well known that their contemporary Najlb Mahfüz (b. 1911) was the
first Arab writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize in 1988. He also dedicated
his attention to the past, carrying on the tradition of the historical novel,
but extending it back to Pharaonic Egypt in Abath al-aqddr ("The Play of
the Fates", 1939), Rddubts (1943) and Kifdh tibah ("Thebes' Fight", 1944).
Mahfüz was interested in this ancient period because the notion of Pharaon-
ism was rather popular in Egyptian society during the 1930s and 1940s, al¬
though pre-Islamic and Islamic history still predominated in modern Arabic
literature. Regarding these early works of Mahfüz, especially the first one,
Roger Allen evaluates it accurately, concluding that "the result falls very
much within the framework of other historical novels written earlier, with a
great deal of action and little penetration beneath the surface of the charac¬
ters". 8 However, the correlation of the past with the present has changed con¬
siderably in Mahfüz's historical novels, and it is therefore not accidental that
Hilary Kilpatrick has commented on the last two works that "their chief
interest lies in their relevance to the contemporary Egyptian situation". 9
If we start from the opposition of the past and the present as the dominant
property of the genre, the typological and genetic aspects of the study of the
historical novel become unified into an indivisible system, where structure
and concrete historical forms are manifestly interlinked, and under which
conditions of the specificity of artistic time gains immensely in importance.
In Mahfüz's works time is thus two-dimensional, conceptual time, knowable
logically, and perceptional time, existing only in imagination and fancy. The
visible, figurative description of the past, when the writer moves through the
ages from the present to what is behind it, produces a distortion of the tem¬
poral relationship between the narrator and the object of his representation.
It is precisely the sense of temporal distance between the narrator and the
event which is the specific feature of Mahfüz's historical novels. The cor¬
relation of narrative time and the time of the events taking place becomes
the dominating structural element, through which the interdependence of
past and present is revealed clearly. During his preparations for the first
historical novels the author probably used a translation of the book Ancient
Egypt (London, 1912), which he published in 1932, as well as other histori¬
cal and literary sources, among them the works of "the father of history,"
Herodotus, and of G. Maspero, the founder of the French Institute of Ori¬
ental Archaeology in Cairo (1881).
In Abath al-aqddr Najlb Mahfüz recreates the legend of the Pharaoh
Khufu (Hüfü) and the magicians of Ancient Egypt. He pays attention
8 Allen 1982, p. 56.
9 Kilpatrick 1992, p. 239.
especially to a prediction by one of the magicians and interprets it in his own
way: in the novel Khufu's son's attempt to kill his father and seize power is
unsuccessful, and the priest's son becomes Khufu's heir by his marriage to
the Pharaoh's daughter. Mahfüz's corrections have as their aim the destruc¬
tion of a myth, although the motif of fate and predestination remains. As in
'Abath al-aqddr the author gives free rein to his imagination in the next novel
Rädübis, where a courtesan already well known to us from Herodotus' His¬
tory becomes one of the main heroes. Some facts of her biography, as well
as the related political events, are depicted rather loosely, by including and
mixing material from different periods of Pharaonic Egypt. The next work,
Kifdh tibah, is closer to historical facts than the previous novels, its plot and
action being primarily based on events, which took place during the founda¬
tion of the New Kingdom.
It is important to note that the author treats the legends, tales and known
events of the past according to some modern Arabic narrative traditions.
Najlb Mahfüz has stressed his adherence to the national heritage, both in his
public appearance, 10 and through his creative activity. Therefore the style of
the narration, the compositional means and the artistic expressions become
functional with respect to the temporal structure of his works.
The historical novel is virtually a refraction of the systems of points of
view into each other, a search for a concept of history. Consciously or not,
Mahfüz carries the contemporary disposition into his works. They take the
reader back to remote ages, but were created during the first years of King
Farouk's rule (1936-1952) in Egypt. To interpret history the writer starts
from the contemporary social situation, from the new necessity of artistic
consciousness. In that way, the past is more a means than an end. In all three
novels Mahfüz pushes the personality of the ruler into the foreground. From
historical sources the Pharaoh Khufu is known for his tyranny, but Mahfüz
describes him in Abath al-aqddr as a just ruler, looking after his children
and citizens; nevertheless in this work the main accent falls on the personal
conflict. In the second novel the author exposes the contradiction between
the ruler's private interests and his national obligations. The young Pharaoh
falls in love with Rädübis and neglects his duties, and in the end he is killed
by a rebellious uprising. In Tähä WädT's opinion, the Pharaoh Ahmoses
(Ahmas) from Kifdh tibah personifies the author's ideal because he drives
out the foreign invaders as he has promised to his people 11 and becomes a
founder of the next dynasty. Endowed with many attractive traits, Mahfüz's
hero inevitably reminds us of a valiant knight (fdris al-fursdn) from the
10 Ghälib 1982,p. 53.
11 WADI 1972, p. 88.
Arabic popular folk epics, although he lacks the psychological depth of the
characters whom the writer recreates in his subsequent works.
When any work is analyzed, the intersection of present and past are al¬
ways expressed through the poetics of the text. There is an affinity between
the real world, which is given an aesthetic meaning by the artist, and its spe¬
cific realization in the form of a novel. In recent decades works dealing with
the problems of national history have shown a tendency to turn towards the
present. Consequently, there have been dynamic changes in the genre struc¬
ture as well as the narrative technique in the historical novel.
The appearance of the historical novel as a new genre implies that it has
now begun to assimilate to the kind of novel that deals with the present. As
Valeria Kirpichenko has pointed out,
"the themes of the contemporary social novel entered Egyptian prose through
the historical novel. They already occur in the first books by Najlb Mahfüz,
the virtual creator of the novel genre. In his 'Pharaonic' cycle there is the ker¬
nel of the ideas that subsequently took shape as knotty social and philosophi¬
cal themes." 12
If in the classic historical novel the present makes itself felt within the formal
mode of representation of the past, in our own time the present itself takes
part in the artistic world, through its own image. Being in direct contact
with the reader, the author (the narrator) becomes an exponent and a bearer
of contemporary thought.
What is of extreme relevance here, is the view that
"the depiction of the past in the novel does not suppose the modernization of
this past at all ... On the contrary, the objective representation of the past is re¬
ally possible only in the novel. The present with its new experiences remains as
the actual form of vision ... but it must not penetrate into the depicted content as a power that modernizes and distorts the specificity of the past." 13
The novels that have been written recently do not coincide with these ideas
in many aspects. There the present does not penetrate into "the depicted
content" of the past but exists within its own content.
The relations between the present and the past thus become complex in
these novels, as their interlacing is revealed through identical images, expres¬
sions, situations and stylistic devices. This new genre is read and interpreted
as simultaneously both historical and contemporary in content. Neverthe¬
less, its essence is invariable and manifests itself through the contiguity of
these two times.
12 Kirpichenko 1986, pp. 28-29.
13 Bakhtin 1978, p. 472.
After the "Pharaoh's Cycle", Najlb Mahfüz published the so-called
Cairene novels, which included al-Qähirah al-jadidah ("New Cairo", 1945),
Khan al-Khalili (1946), Zuqäq al-midaqq ("Midaqq Alley", 1947), al-Saräb
("The Mirage", 1948), and Bidäyah wa-nihäyah ("Beginning and End",
1949). These works represent a new stage in Mahfüz's evolution as a writer.
There he turns specifically to contemporary problems, as he retraces the de¬
velopment of Egyptian society in the 20 th century by recreating the dramatic
and tragic destinies of his heroes. The author's epic and rationalistic think¬
ing expresses itself through the objective and logical style of the narration
and the compositional symmetry of the novels.
The fully developed concept of the Arabic novel in the fifties is expressed by
the Trilogy ("al-Thuläthiyyah"), written by Mahfüz at the beginning of 1952.
It includes Bayn al-qasrayn ("Between two Palaces", 1956), 14 Qasr al-shawq
("Palace of Desire", 1957) and al-Sukkariyyah ("Sugar Street", 1957). Valeria
Kirpichenko notes that, in genre, the Trilogy is similar to "the family epic
represented in European literature by The Forsyte Saga of John Galsworthy,
Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann and other well-known works." 15 Mahfüz's
Trilogy goes beyond the framework of the novel that describes only a family
history. The plot of the narrative is connected with the life of Ahmad 'Abd
al-Jawwäd's family, actually through three generations, but they are shown
against a background of significant events in modern Egyptian history.
The author recreates the different stages of the struggle for national inde¬
pendence and discussions about ways to achieve it, as well as the conflicts
and contradictions provoked by the historical backwardness of the East in
relation to the West. He also expresses the heroes' desire to overcome this
backwardness. Therefore, the present described by the author is consciously
perceived as a part of the national history. Mahfüz's novels have been highly
praised both by readers and critics from East and West. As Hilary Kil¬
patrick has observed, "in its length and the scale of its conception the Tril¬
ogy far surpasses any previous Egyptian novel; indeed, in its own genre it
has remained unequalled. Mahfüz's achievement here is many-sided." 16
The next work by Mahfüz, Awläd häratinä ("The Children of Our Quar¬
ter", 1959), 17 is no less interesting, and becomes the specific prelude to the
maelstrom of post-revolutionary Egyptian life represented in the works of the
sixties. Mahmüd Amin al-'älim considers this novel "the beginning of the phil¬
osophical stage in Mahfüz's works". 18 Tähä Wädi perceives it as "a dialogical
14 The English translation has the title "Palace walk."
15 Kirpichenko 1986, p. 34.
16 Kilpatrick 1992, p. 243.
17 The English translation has the title "Children of Gebelawi."
narration with philosophical content." 19 Like the Trilogy, the plot of this novel
is based on the description of several generations of an extended Egyptian fam¬
ily. In its compositional aspect, Valeria Kirpichenko defines it as
"the cycle of the legends about Jabaläwl, his children and descendants who have
become famous for their deeds. These legends are passed on orally by the in¬
habitants of the street from one generation to another and have also been done
by the narrator." 20
If in the Trilogy the investigation of reality is limited to a concrete time frame
(1917-1944), in Awläd häratinä it becomes much wider. The chronotope of the
novel includes not only the national space: time itself is mobile and fluctuating.
From the individual psychological dimension, it moves to the social and histori¬
cal plane and from them to the sphere of eternity. The author uses mythological
material, and invokes the Arabic-Islamic heritage as well as Biblical history. In
Roger Allen's opinion, Awläd häratinä is "an allegorical survey of mankind's
religious history". 21 In the spirit of Muhammad 'Abduh's ideas, Najlb Mahfüz
interprets the history of the beginnings of religions and examines the problem
of the relations between religion and science. Therefore it is not accidental that
figures from the Qur'än and the Bible are the prototypes of his heroes. 22
Religious and philosophical issues determine to some extent the objec¬
tive character and completeness of the reality recreated by Mahfüz in the
novel. In history, the writer looks for consonance with the present, and it
is this which governs his perception of normal and exceptional situations
and personages. It gives the author an opportunity to represent the rela¬
tions between different times, to assert the concept of the unity of moral
and religious values as the most important criteria of good and evil and the
condition for peace of mind and spiritual harmony.
In Mahfüz's work, the interest in history is controlled not by the invasion
of the present into the past but, on the contrary, by the penetration of the
past into the present. As a result, it leaves traces in the poetic structure of the
novel that go back to shared traits in folk literature. But Awläd häratinä can¬
not be called a historical novel in the traditional sense of the word. It would
be more accurate to regard it as a kind of philosophical novel, which is very
18 Al-*Alim 1970, p. 82.
19 WädI 1972, p. 111.
20 Kirpichenko 1986, p. 43.
21 Allen 1982, p. 59.
22 For the motif of the hostile brothers in Mahfüz' book, see Sebastian Günther:
'"Hostile Brothers' in transformation. An archetypical conflict figuring in classical and mod¬
ern Arabic literature." In: Myths, Historical Archetypes and Symbolic Figures in Arabic Lit¬
erature. Ed. by Angelika Neuwirth et al. Wiesbaden 1999, pp. 309-336, esp. pp. 327-332.
similar to the European allegorical novel in its structure, in its correlation of
the historical basis and fiction and in its stylized manner of narration.
The intensity of historical development at the end of the 20 th century has
sharpened interest in history. Some problems of the past still actually have
the same significance in our time. This is especially true of Arabic literature,
where the national Renaissance began later. Arab writers refer to the past for
many reasons, but they also try to sum up its grand total and overall achieve¬
ments in a contemporary perspective. 23 This results in the appearance of the
novel forms among which must be mentioned the metaphorical, figurative
novel, as well as works concentrating on the objective epic representation of
past ages and events which are genuinely the „pre-history" of the present.
This traditional type of novel is rather popular in Arabic literature. It
is represented, for example, by the Tunisian author al-Bashir Hurayyif's
(1917— 1983) 24 Barq al-Layl (1961), which was awarded a national prize. In Kr-
ystyna Skarzynska-Bochenska's opinion, the works of Hurayyif are char¬
acterized by a combination of romantic and realistic features. 25 What is clearly
revealed in the novel Barq al-Layl is that the objective and the subjective ways
of describing the past are inseparable: each one exists through the other.
The author depicts the reality of the remote past and revives the images
of national life in the 16 th century by describing the invasion of the country
by foreigners and the fierce opposition of the Tunisians. Nevertheless, the
main line of the plot is concerned with the destiny of a young slave who
resembles the legendary hero 'Antara ibn Shaddäd, the son of a noble war¬
rior and a black slave-girl. Like him, Hurayyif's hero Barq al-Layl (which
literally means "lightning of the night") is a fighting man, full of mettle and
generosity, a connoisseur of art and beauty.
This type of hero corresponds exactly to that preferred by authors of
historical fiction. In this novel, there are many-sided political intrigues and
love affairs, conspiracies, pursuits and single combats, unexpected and sud¬
den changes in the heroes' life through flight or moral lapses, and elements
of farce and slapstick. In addition, the style and narrative form conform
completely to the essence of the events, which had taken place many years
before, as well as to the artistic tradition existing in those days. Fawzi cAbd
al-Qädir al-MTlädi emphasizes the closeness of the poetics of Hurayyif s
novel to the narrative method of the Arabian Nights. 26
23 See Ulrike Stehli: Die Darstellung des Oktoberkrieges von 1973 in der syrischen
Erzählliteratur. Wiesbaden 1988.
24 Al-Bashir Hurayyif like his elder brother Mustafa (1910-1967) began his career with the writing of short stories. The first version of Barq al-Layl appeared in 1960.
25 Skarzynska-Bochenska 1989, pp. 401, 405.
In recent decades, interest in the Arabic historical and cultural herit¬
age, especially in the variations of genre and style in classical literature and
folklore, has been increasing steadily. The evidence of this can be seen in
the way Arab writers from various countries appropriate one or another
component of the national heritage according to their individual creative
peculiarities and aesthetic goal. Thus, in 1974 the Palestinian writer Emll
Hablbi (1922-1996) published his novel al-Waqä'i' al-gharibah fi ikhtifa
Said Abi al-Nahs al-Mutashail (i.e. "The Secret Life of SaTd, the Ill-fated
Pessoptimist", 1982). Roger Allen notes that
"the extraordinary elaborateness of the language of the title, the presence of a hu¬
morous antihero and the sense of the parody which is thereby created, and the
use of short chapters to recount episodes, all give HablbT's work a refreshingly
unique quality within the corpus of modern Arabic novels and at the same time
link his work clearly with the classical tradition of the maqämah genre." 27
Emll Hablbi skillfully uses the compositional and stylistic devices of clas¬
sical literature and specifically adopts al-Jähiz's irony to accentuate the dis¬
similarity of the narrator and the reader's ideas. He also quotes pre-Islamic
and Islamic authors. These reminiscences are intended to stimulate the read¬
ers' memory and their associative perception.
HablbT's work might be called a metaphorical novel. In comparison with
the objective epic work where the concept of the person serves as the starting
point for the artistic analysis of reality, in "al-Waqä'i c al-gharibah fi ikhtifä'
Sa'id Abi al-Nahs al-Mutashail" the concept of the person itself becomes
the subject of severe criticism. The presence of two different aspects in the
narration, the aspect of the plot representing the hero's life and the "mytho¬
logical" aspect in the design of the whole universe, is subordinate to this
aim. Their organic interdependence is achieved in such a way that the events
forming the plot present themselves as elements in an extensive metaphor
actually determining the artistic concept of the novel.
The structural vantage point for the construction of the plot-metaphor
becomes the title of the work itself with the specific expansion of the se¬
mantic scope of the words. There are "strange events" (waqai 1 gharibah)
connected with the hero, who has as his first name Said (which means
"happy"), as his surname al-Nahs ("the unlucky" or "the ill-fated") and
26 He even entitled his article on this topic as Barq al-Layl between Historical Reality
and The Thousand and One Nights, cf. al-MIlädI 1969, p. 77.
27 Allen 1992, p. 200. - For a study of the language, contents, structure and the nar¬
rative perspective of this book, see also Neuwirth's epilogue to its German translation,
published under the title E. Habibi: Der Peptimist. Oder von den seltsamen Vorfällen um
das Verschwinden Saids des Glücklosen. Roman aus Palästina. Basel 1992, esp. 243-257.
as his nickname al-Mutashail ("the pessoptimist"). It is this metaphor, as
established in the title, which defines the factual outline of the narration of
the troubles of the antihero's life and turns the dynamic of the story into the
course of "the internal plot."
Habibl's novel plunges so deeply into the inner world of the character that
the presence of history almost loses its significance. However, the events of
national history build up the image of his hero, who is represented as a pes¬
simist and an optimist at the same time. Thus, Emll Hablbi draws upon his
heritage not only for artistic purposes but also in search of historical roots,
the sources of the psychology of the Palestinian, as well as in the attempt
to understand and to give a meaning to his behavior and actions under the
prevailing circumstances.
Historical roots and national memory are at the center of many works by
the Egyptian journalist and writer Jamal al-Ghltänl (b. 1945) whom Sabry
Hafez inscribes among the „ten leading names of the sixties' generation". 28
It is no coincidence that this writer was interested in the chronicle Badai'al-
zuhür fi waqä'i' al-duhür ("The Marvelous Flowers Concerning the Events
of the Centuries") written by Ibn Iyäs (d. 1524). In fact, he used material
drawn from it in several of his short stories in the collection Awräq shähb
'äsha mundh alf'äm ("The Papers of the Young Man Who Lived a Thousand
Years Ago", 1969), which might be considered as the preparatory stage in his
creation of new narrative forms. In his first novel, Al-Zayni Barakät (1974),
Jamal al-Ghltänl once again returns to Ibn Iyäs's chronicle. In Pierre
Cachia's opinion, in these works the author succeeded in projecting himself
into a different century and adopting its linguistic peculiarities. 29
The novel Al-Zayni Barakät leans strongly towards a metaphorical de¬
scription of history. Its philosophical and historical problems arise from the
reality contemporary with the writer, and they clearly override the artistic
interpretation of the past. As Hilary Kilpatrick remarks, "although set
in Mamluk Cairo it is clearly intended as a commentary on contemporary
Egyptian society; the choice of historical period is not accidental." 30
Generally the plot of the novel is based on the same significant events and
persons described in the dynastic chronicles, but al-Ghltänl recreates them
according to his own historical and aesthetic concepts, introducing invented
characters personifying various social strata of modern Egypt. Among them
the image of the young Sa'ld al-Juhayni stands out prominently, and through
his life experience the author tries to represent the relation of the past and
28 Hafez 1992, p. 327.
29 Cachia 1992, p. 415.
30 Kilpatrick 1992, p. 265.
the present, the essence of the recent historical moment. This fact explains
the narrative form of the novel and its poetical structure. The style of the
chapters is unequal and idiosyncratic, and their expressive diversity depends
on the heroes' points of view, which change dynamically from objective de¬
scriptions to subjective creations, often in a stream of consciousness. The
writer resorts to the device of the fictional narrator as well as to the evidence
of witnesses and participants in the events. The correlation of the different
historical periods becomes clearer by this means. The chronotope of the
novel is expanded by the complication of a narrative time, which for poetic
reasons is simultaneously located both in history and in the present.
The same tendency is apparent in al-Ghltänl's Kitäb al-tajalliyät ("The
Book of Revelations", 1983). This book is also characterized by a many-
sided compositional structure, and comes close to being a parable in terms
of the contemporary notion that national history can modify human nature.
As in the previous novel, al-Ghitänl uses historical sources, in this case the
Arabic mystical heritage. In the center of the novel there are three main
figures: Imäm al-Husayn, Jamal 'Abd al-Näsir and the writer's father. The
author-narrator - through his "revelations", impressions and recollections -
represents their images, as well as the events of the different centuries. In the
correlation of history and present time, the author's contemporary approach
is decisive in determining the genre of the work.
Conclusions
Arabic novels describing the remote past and recent times represent an entire
literary universe, and in a brief survey such as this it is impossible to avoid
subjectivity and incompleteness. This article has attempted to touch merely
on the prominent features of a number of novels that reveal the importance
of the chronotope and its place in the genre system of literature, by which
means we can usefully examine the contemporary artistic process.
In this light, the appearance of novels of the allegorical type beside the ob¬
jective epic works can be seen as a natural phenomenon. Also to be taken into
consideration is the evidence of those novels that are just as historical as they
are contemporary: they can face the past, the present and eternity at the same
time, as, for example, when a mythological plot-structure is used. Various
novels that have other kinds of temporal reference are likewise drawn into
this synthesis, and the difference between them has become correspondingly
less striking than it was before. However, in the historical novel the center
of gravity moves from the past to the present, while in works depicting our
own time it is the opposite, and the center of gravity is carried backwards. In
other words, the present is included in the artistic description of the past as
far as the past defines the image of the present, and this may account for some
of the particular characteristics of the contemporary Arabic novel.
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Bhakti and/or Prapatti}
By Srilata Raman Müller, Heidelberg
Introduction
The formation and consolidation of the Srivaisnava theology between the
10 th and 14 th centuries of the Christian era has been a particularly fruit¬
ful area of indological research because of the divergent textual traditions
which feed into this theology. The bringing together of these textual tradi¬
tions, in turn, involved a theologically highly sophisticated and complex
process of canon formation which by general scholarly consensus falls into
two phases with some clear disjunctures between them. The first phase
being that of the first three teachers Näthamuni (traditional dates: ca. 9 th
century ce), Yämunä (traditional dates: 918-1038 ce) and Rämänuja (tradi¬
tional dates: 1017-1137 ce) and the second phase that of the post-Rämänuja
äcäryas culminating with Vedänta Desika (traditional dates: 1268-1369 ce).
Scholars have tended to locate one such important disjuncture between the
two phases in the area of Srlvaisnava soteriology: the extant writings of both
Yämuna and Rämänuja seemed to stress a soteriology of bhaktiyoga also
called dhyäna or upäsanä, 1 and derived from exegesis on the Bhagavadgitä,
while the writings of the post-Rämänuja äcäryas seemed to neglect bhak¬
tiyoga and speak, instead, of a concept of seeking the feet of Visnu-Näräyana
for salvational purposes and simply surrendering to him. This latter concept
was called, variously, saranägati or prapatti from pra+pad meaning "to take
refuge in", van Buitenen's comments on this perceived doctrinal divide
between Rämänuja and his successors in this regard are characteristic:
This progress of the aspirant to God by way of karma-, jnäna-, and bhaktiyoga,
which are not separate roads but successive stages of the same way culminating
in the attainment of God, is for Rämänuja the fundamental teaching of the Gltä.
But we miss in this brief exposition of Rämänuja's views that mystic doctrine
1 Famously defined by Rämänuja as an uninterrupted remembrance (of God) akin to
the continuous flow of oil in the Sribhäsya (1. 1.1):... dhyänam hi tailadhärävad avicchin
nasmrtisantänarüpam ...
