In the wanderings of the nomads the poet gave the signal to break camp and indicated where and when the tribe should halt (1)

(1)

PROPHETIC VISION IN MODERN ARABIC POETRY

Von As'ad Khayrallah, Beirut

It is difficult to understand the best works in modern Arabic poetry without

being aware of the revolution of the 'New Poets' , i.e., not those who simply

reject traditional prosody, but those who also struggle to recuperate the poet's

pre-lslamic mission of seer and guide.

Among the Arabs, says Alfred Guillaume,

the poet { Shamir, i.e., 'the knower' Ear_exenence_),

as his name implies, was a person endowed with

knowledge by the spirits who gave him his magical

powers: his poetry was not art, it was supernatural

knowledge. In the wanderings of the nomads the poet

gave the signal to break camp and indicated where

and when the tribe should halt (1).

In modern times, the poet's function in the context of a desert tribe has to

be revived in the context of a whole civilization. Thus, the new poetics is no

accident: it answers a crying need for cultural and spiritual leadership, a

need resulting from the collapse of the old order along with its gods and

prophets. The agony is not recent, but the consciousness thereof has never

been as acute as during this century, after a deeper contact and acquaintance

with the West.

Yet, not all modern Arab poets are prophets, nor do they claim to be; and,

although they continue to be neighbours in time and place and even on the pages

of the same revue, they may be rooted in different worlds. For example, here

is a part of a poem by Saläh ®Abd al-Sabür (b. 1931 - Egypt) published in the

Journal of Arabic Literature , Volume II, and entitled

My Star my only Star (2)

Here you rise on time

My star, my only star,

]oy> my happiest time,

Asi step towards the house.

My heart aflame with love.

And in my breast a bunch of flowers lies asleep.

We shall retire together to a distant corner, Happy like a pair of affectionate cats.

Tracing what the days of misery have left

On my tired face and your long-suffering cheeks.

My star, my only star.

We are still -- the world is still . ..

Still sad.

As I climb up the stairs.

And I knock on the chest of the door,

A tired voice replies

(2)

' Proceed if you are a friend? ' ' Peace' I say;

In this world I own nothing but the word 'peace' ,

Etc. ...

This is clearly an expression of a world familiar to us in its language,

imagery, and structure. The house is the kind of house we know, time is the

time we know, and the world is still sad the same old world with its

same old sadness.

On the opposite page of the same revue, we find a poem by Adünis (b. 1930-

Syria), entitled:

The Little Times (3)

Ours is the deceitful mirage and the sightless day;

Ours is the guide's corpse;

We are the generation of the Arc

The children of these little times.

The faithful seas that chant the dirge of departure

Have brought us to this maze —

We are the generation of the long dispute

Between our ruins and God.

Here we are immediately cast into a different world, not so easy to enter

or grasp: the sightless day, the guide's corpse, the generation of the Arc,

the seas chanting an elegy of departure, the dispute (or rather dialogue){4)

between our ruins and God, etc. . .. and the interrelationship of all these

elements are not clearly familiar. We are thrown here in the atmosphere of

a mysterious land created by a visionary poet, and as long as we have no in¬

sight into the totality of his vision, we will remain foreign to the details of

his landscape.

On an earlier page still, Adünis does not hide his claim for vision, when,

in a poem entitled "1 said to you", he declares:

I said to you, ' 1 have listened to the seas

Reciting their poetry to me; I have listened

To the music that lies dormant in shells. '

I said to you, ' 1 have sung

At the devil's wedding, at the banquet of fables. '

1 said to you, ' 1 have seen

In the rain of history, in the blaze of distance,

A fairy and a mansion. '

Because my sea journeys take place in my eye

I said to you, ' I was able to see all

At the very first step I took. '

Here is a poet who "listens", "sings" and "sees". The poetry of oceans,

the music of shells, the devil's wedding, the banquet of fables, the fairy of

history and the house in the blazing distance are ail seen at the very first

step of a journey that takes place in his eyes, for it is an inner vision.

It is then this kind of vision that 1 call prophetic; not as much because it

foretells a specific event in time and space, but mainly because it uncovers

the true character of reality beyond time and space. For the 'New Poet' ,

the poetic act is no longer a .simple versification of a given 'truth' or personal

feeling in a ready made language and structure, it is rather an adventure into

(3)

the night of the soul, a quest into the Unknown hidden at the depths of the

poet's self, that microcosm which mirrors the whole universe.

Hence, the poet is a prophet only in as much as he expands our channels

to the divine dimensions latent in us, and captures those illuminating rays

that facilitate our communion with the Absolute hidden in our hearts and in

the heart of the universe.

And yet, the poet's vision is not totally devoid of any impact on the future,

for this vision is active knowledge. Indeed, any insight into the higher scheme

of reality widens our knowledge of the future as well. It enters actively into

the shaping of our Weltanschauung and of what it entails on the ontological,

ethical, and aesthetic levels. Whence the fundamental role the poets play in

shaping human life through shaping the ideology that conditions action (5).

In descending to the depths of the soul, the poet-prophet discovers a higher

scheme through a verbal vision. In other words: where no language can reach,

no vision shines; words are the wires without which no electricity sparkles.

Thus, the poet sees with his language, creates with his language, and what he

creates is a linguistic monad that is independent and self-sufficient. Every

new vision is thus a revision and re-creation of the world as contained and

mirrored in this monad. It is a totally new beginning, which engenders a

fundamental change in the natures and structures of self and world.

Orpheus (6)

A lover, I roll in the darkness of Hell

A stone, but I shine

I have a date with the temple virgins

In the bed of the antique god

My words are winds that shake life

My singing is sparks

I am a language for a coming god

I am the magician of dust.

In the poetic act, the old self, like a phoenix, is burnt out, and a new

self rises from its ashes. The poem is not only an act of self-destruction

and self-creation, it is a new vision that reshapes the nature and relation¬

ships of self, society and world in a new organic unity: it announces the

coming god and gives him identity:

Yet the graves that yawn

In my words

Embraced my songs

With a god who drives away the rocks

From above us

Who loves his own misery

And blesses even Hell

Prays with me my prayers

And brings back innocence to the face of life (7).

The new organic unity is a network of interwoven symbols which are poly-

dimensional and which interplay in a complex whole. Ideally, this interplay

should result in a balance of tensions produced by the dialectical movement

of body and soul, self and other, abstract and concrete, reality and dream

etc. . .All this goes to embody the new vision dynamically incarnated in the

poem. Every poem is an attempt to go deeper into that intricate totality. The

(4)

whole work of a poet finally becomes a closed system of poly-significant,

mutueilly reflective and mutually illuminating sparks, or stars, in a moving

constallation that becomes the poet's personal mythology and that, if deep

and encompassing enough, may reproduce the matrix of the Real (which one

may also call: life or God) for a whole race, age, or culture.

In the darkness and loss of a world without gods, the poets stand out as

our sole hope for a myth that endows our existence with meaning and direction;

they are the thieves of fire, and for that end they endure for us the pains most

prophets endured to redeem the fallen man.

Needless to say that this new poetics has been largely foreshadowed by Western

Romantic, Symbolist and Surrealist poetics. It has also been influencial through

Existentialist thought. Already at the beginning of this century, Blake and Nietz¬

sche made a great impact on the first modern Arab poet-prophet, Gibrän Halil

Gibrän (1883-1931). Speaking of redemption, "Vender Erlösung", Nietzsche's

Zarathustra describes himself as follows:

Ein Seher, ein Wollender, ein Schaffender,

eine Zukunft selber und eine Brücke zur Zukunft —

und ach, auch noch gleichsam ein Krüppel an dieser

Brücke: das alles ist Zarathustra.

Heidegger, another German Existentialist declares poetry as the "wort¬

hafte Stiftung des Seins" (8)

Poetry is then the verbsil grounding of Being. Ideally of course, each poem

should be a new grounding. But reality often falls short of the ideal. So what

results do we get?

Most leading poets have been influenced, more or less deeply, by the new

poetics described above. Its keenest advocate, however, is Adünis (Ali Ah¬

mad Sa'^Td), who, both in his theoretical and critical writings (9), as well

as in his poetic practice, has done most to propagate the notion of the equi¬

valence between poetry and prophetic vision. Consequently, Adünis himself

may be here the best illustration of the practical results of such a notion.

Here, then,is "the Beginning of Vision" (lO) Voices ...

Gathering in the squares / We have collected

the science of horizons, the guide-book of embers:

Today, that the Earth is like a new moon.

Today, we will murder this age.

After murdering the age, poets have to invent a new one and a new language

to name things unseen before, and to chart lands through which no previous

Imagination has ever travelled. Here's Adünis' s vision of

The Beginning of Letters (11)

We have named

The olive trees ©Ally

The street a fätiha (l2) for the sun, the wind a passport

And the bird a way ...

and here's his vision of

The Beginning of Writing (l3)

The way is blood and destruction

I have made writing an abyss, I am ready: my head draws

My words hang down ... near ...

My body is hanging down ...

(5)

Much of the poet's imagery may sound vague. Actually, at a poetry recital

in May, 1975 (at the Goethe- Institut in Beirut), Adünis was accused of va¬

gueness and mystification by some of his own students ans disciples, i.e.,

by many of those who may accept his poetics but find much difficulty to under¬

stand his poetry. This difficulty may be substantially reduced by an elucidation

of the poet's total vision. Within the framework of the poetics in question,

this elucidation is perhaps the most useful and legitimale function of a critic.

Adünis has a Heraclitean vision of reality supplemented by his notion of

poetry as prophetic vision and as an act of redemption. Reality, for him, is

a permanent flux of Becoming, which is best symbolized by a flowing river,

or a blazing fire. This consciousness of perpetual change generates an acute

consciousness of time and death: all the more need for the poet, whose re¬

deeming prophetic vision, incarnated in a poem, performs a ritual cult that

heralds and celebrates the cycle of death and rebirth.

The poem, or this new grounding of Being, bestows presence on the anonym¬

ous fleeting moments and objects. It does so in an organic linguistic structure,

whence the capital importance of language for the performance of this ritual.

Moreover, a poet cannot be a redeemer without being himself burnt out by

the fire of life in order to be reborn in a new form, and, thus, save himself,

mankind and the universe. Nietzsche's Zarathustra had already told us "Vom

Weg des Schaffenden":

Verbrennen mußt du dich wollen

in deiner eigenen Flamme: wie

wollest du neu werden, wenn du

nicht Asche geworden bist!

As a result of this vision, one may notice in Adünis' s poetry some major

features recurrently examplified in the following motifs: (l) The poetic ex¬

perience, (2) The quest, (3) Language as metaphor, and (4) The dialectics

of change and metamorphosis.

1. The poetic experience. This motif is an affirmation of the creative and

visionary nature of poetry. As a dynamic act of knowledge, poetry becomes

the means and the end, the vehicle of vision and the experience itself. This

is easy to justify: the identification between poem, poet and world makes the

description of any of them symbolic of the two others. Since every poem is

an experience of self-destruction and self-creation, it is only naturel that

it be the most important phenomenon to express.

2. The Quest. As a vision of the Unknown, poetry is acquired only at the

price of dangerous risks. The quest is a cosmic epic where the death-rebirth

drama takes place. This drama resembles a passion play where the stagnant

self is burnt out by the fire of change. The poetic adventure is symbolized by

various ways which represent in their totality an interplay of the four elements

of nature, which interact as actors in the cosmic drama of death and rebirth.

The journey starts out from the narrow self and its connotations: house, stability,

decay etc. symbolized by dust, earth, and various features of stagnation, heav¬

iness and death, or by features of emprisonment and cosy, static existence:

prisons, walls, traditions, family etc. The traveller has a yearning for the

Absolute, the unlimited distances and infinite time, both outside and within

him. The adventure could take place through water, as a sailing journey on

the ever changing waves of life. There, Ulysses is evoked:

(6)

I look for Ulysses (14) I go astray in the sulfur caves

I embrace the sparks

I surprise the secrets

In the incense cloud, and the demon's nails ..

I look for Ulysses

May be he erects his days a Mi^rig (15) for me

May be he tells me, tells me what the waves ignore.

The poet resorts to all the aspects of sailing, the darkness of oceans, and

the dangers and strangeness of the journey. Water may also be evoked in

the image of rain and of running rivers, symbolizing both life and the swift

current of time. The poet is himself "The wind that never blows backwards,

and the river that never goes up-stream". (16).

The wind is another favorite symbol of the power to move and to soar in

the heights of the cosmos. This power is alluded to by things that are associated

with the wind: birds, thunders, moving clouds, lightnings etc. In addition to

the image of the Mi©räg, Icarus is often evoked:

A Memory of Wings (17)

Icarus passed here

He pitched his tent beneath these leaves,

breathed fire in the green chambers

of the frailest buds

and shuddered and sighed.

Tense as a shuttle,

he drank himself dizzy

and flew for the sun.

He never burned.

He never returned, this Icarus.

Here we meet Icarus breathing fire m frail buds, a good example of the

successful marriage of elements AdunTs is always performing. And Fire is

the most important of these elements. The poet is constantly praying for it

to consume everything and prepare for the new life to come. It is the source

of light and heat, both symbols of life. The best symbol for this metamorphosis

is the phoenix, to whom the poet chants long incantations to induce him to

burn himself and be reborn anew

Phoenix, keep my eyes on you, keep my eyes!

Phoenix, die! Phoenix, die!

Phoenix, O Christ, O cross

in a strange world (l8)

The poet identifies himself with the phoenix, at least in dream if not in reality:

So, for a last time, O Phoenix, let me dream

embrace the fire

disappear in the fire Phoenix! O Phoenix!

You, guide of the road! (19)

The phoenix symbol can easily metamorphose into another basic symbol

of death and rebirth, viz., Tammüz, (20) who stands for the struggle with

(7)

the forces of nature, for blood spilling, a sign of both life and death, and

for a rebirth of nature symbolized by the various agricultural festivities. The

same symbol can metamorphose to an even more suitable one, due to its

artistic dimensions, viz. , that of Orpheus.

Christ may, however, be the most important of all these symbols. For

even though Adünis is moslem (®AlawI) by birth, his Weltanschauung brings

him closest to the notion of the Absolute incarnated in the particular, and

loving the particular to the extent of being crucified in order to redeem it,

and descending to Hell, then resurrecting, thus redeeming all time and all

space.

In this manner, the total work of the poet becomes the stage of a cosmic epic,

in which all the moving elements of water, air and fire combine to shatter

the inertia of the dust and stones of the earth. But these moving elements

have no 'presence' outside the dust that moves, the stone or the salamander

that survives the flame, or the island that resists the waves. After the ritual

of death and rebirth, all nature is gloriously reborn: the symbols are mainly

agricultural and celebrate the new fertility.

3. Languaige as metaphor. In all this, and in harmony with the central role

of language, one may say that never before in Arabic poetry have poets created

such a complex and extented metaphor of language and its connotations, i.e.,

speaking and listening, writing and reading, along with all their organs, tools

or media. Language, as metaphor, takes priority even over the metaphors

of seeing, since the poet sees basically with, and in, his language.

The Song (2l)

Strangled mute

with syllables, voiceless, with no language but the moaning of the earth,

my song discovers death

in the sick joy

of everything that is

for anyone who listens.

Refusal is my melody.

Words are my life,

and life is my desease.

4. The dialectics of change. I hope the above sketchy analysis does not

sound like a prescription according to which anyone could become a great

poet! For the genius of a poet lies precisely in his power to combine these

symbolic elements into a dynamic and complex whole, within which they inter¬

play and become infinitely more evocative, and this is where lies the interest

in Adünis' s vision. My only hope, however, was to provide a framework,

no matter how simplified, for facilitating the entrance into the world of a poet

whose great cry is rejection - the rejection of all systems, and whose only

immutable law is the law of change. Consequently, the only thing of which

the poet is absolutely sure is the necessity for permanent cjuestioning, both

as rejection of all ready made answers, and as asking questions about every¬

thing, and directing new eyes everywhere, with a child's sense of wonder.

(8)

In this permanent curiosity, every new question furthers the search for new

discoveries, which, rather than being answers, are but starting points for

new questions.

Within this law of change is inherent the law of dialectical contradiction

already imminent in the death-rebirth phenomenon. This phenomenon be¬

comes only a pattern of runnig with the flux and of metamorphosis created

by a tension and balance of opposites, or by that Heraclitean fire changing

constantly and assuming all forms. Thus Adünis embarks on continuous ex¬

perimentations, that may not be always successful, but that enrich his poetry

with unusual dimensions of form and expression. Running with the flux, his

most insistent theme is his being lost, or 'rooted in his steps' . His prophecy

is that of a life where everything is permanently renewing itself and inte¬

grating more and more of its contraditions : of rejection cind faith, of dispair

and love, of reality and dream, of reason and madness. His persona is a

kind of prophet called Mihyar, who is a continuously metamorphosing and

creative visionary. He is a new hero who reconciles all opposites in him¬

self and who is

"The Traveller" (22)

The glass shade of my lamp

reflects me

even after I am gone.

My gospel is denial,

and my map —

a world I've yet to make.

and

"The Wanderer" (23).

A wanderer, I make a prayer

of dust.

Exiled, I sing

my soul until the world

burns to my chants

as to a miracle

Thus am I

risen.

Thus I am redeemed.

Notes

1. Alfred Guillaume, Prophecy and Divination among the Hebrews and Semites

(London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1938), pp. 243-4.

2. Translated by M.M. Badawi in: Journal of Arabic Literature . Vol. II (Leiden

E.J. Brill, 1971), pp. 101-103. The Arabic text is in An-Näs fl Bilädi

Bayrüt: Där al-Ädäb, 1975), p. 125.

3. This and the following peom, 'I said to you', are respectively on pages 100

and 99-100, also translated by M.M. Badawi. The Arabic texts are in: AgänT

4. The word in the original is Eil-tiiwär. See: Agäni Mihyär ad-DimasqI . p. 186.

5. The 'New Poets' have, indeed, become the spiritual leaders in the Arab

world and are heralding a new rhythm into modern Arab life.

6. AgänT Mihyär ad-Dimasql , p. 67.

(9)

7. Ibid. . p. 128-9.

8. Martin Heidegger, Unterwegs zur Sprache , zweite unveränderte Auflage

(Pfullingen: Neske I960), (5,6), p. 41. Quoted in: F. Rifqa, As-Si^

wal-Mawt (Bayrüt: Där an-Nahär, 1973), p. 31.

Där al-®Awda, 1971), pp. 77-143, et passim ; and many articles written

10. Mawäqif . Vol. 30/31, Winter-Spring 1975, p. 128.

11. Also from "Al-Agänl at-Täniya li-Mihyär ad-Dimasqi". Mawäqif . Vol.

30/31, p. 132.

12. May refer to any of its meanings: start, opening, commencement; in¬

troduction, preface, poem etc.; but most probably alludes in the first

place to Fätihat al-Kitäb, i.e., the first süra of the Qur'_än.

13. Ibid. . p."r26'!' 14. Ibid. . p. 88.

15. Ladder, or Ascension (esp. of the prophet Muhammad to Heaven and his

descent to Hell ).

16. Ibid. . p. 14.

17. Translated by Samuel Hazo in: The Blood of Adonis (University of Pitts¬

burgh Press, 1971), p. 29.

19. Ibid. , p. 82.

20. See Ibid. , p. 78-79.

21. The Blood of Adonis , p. 30.

22. Ibid. , p. 27.

23. Ibid. . p. 4. Now that Beirut is burning, it may not be too superfluous

to think of poetry as an act of vision that may foretell as well as pre¬

cipitate action. Thus, the meaning of AdOnls's following poem should not

necessarily be limited to its metaphoric dimension (BadawT's trans.,

p. 101).

The City

Our fire is approaching the city,

To destroy the throne of the city.

We shall destroy the throne of the city.

We shall live and, through the arrows, cross over

To the land of troubled transparency.

Behind that mask hanging on the revolving stone.

Around the whirlpool of terror.

Around speech and echo;

And we shall wash clean the bowels of day, its

intestines and its child.

And burn that patched-up being called the city.

(10)

DIE WIEDERHOLUNG ALS GRUNDSTRUKTUR DER ARABISCHEN SPRACHE (gezeigt am multilateralen Ubersetzungsvergleich)

Von Reinhold Kontzi, Tübingen

In der letzten Zeit ist oft gefragt worden, was zu den wesentlichen Bestand¬

teilen der Sprache überhaupt, oder jeweils einzelner Sprachen gehört. Was

einer bestimmten Sprache oder einer Sprachengruppe wesentlich eigen ist, kann

man durch Vergleichen ermitteln. Eine hervorragende Vergleichsmöglichkeit

bieten uns Ubersetzungen. Jeder zu übersetzende Text ist eine Herausforde¬

rung der einen Sprache an die andere. Diese muß vor dem zu übersetzenden

Text zeigen, was sie leisten kann. Sehr aufschlußreich ist der Vergleich der

Ubersetzungen eines gleichen Textes in mehreren Sprachen. Hier werden

die wesentlichen Züge einer jeden Sprache offenbar. Freilich, damit die Sub¬

jektivitäten der Originalwerke und der Ubersetzer die Ergebnisse nicht ver¬

fälschen, müssen von derselben Sprache immer mehrere Werke mit den Uber¬

setzungen in verschiedenen Sprachen verglichen werden. Außerdem muß die

Ausgangssprache immer wieder wechseln. Und schließlich ergibt auch der Ver¬

gleich der Uber Setzungen unter sich wertvolle Informationen. Besonders auf¬

schlußreich sind zwei oder gar mehrere Ubersetzungen desselben Textes in

derselben Sprache. Dies trifft für die großen Werke der Weltliteratur zu: wie

den Koran, 1001 Nacht, die Göttliche Kommödie, Don Quijote, die Bibel u.a.

Die Methode des multilateralen Ubersetzungsvergleichs hat

Mario Wandruszka, - der frühere Tübinger, jetzt Salzburger Romanist - mei¬

sterhaft entwickelt. Eine Zusammenfassung seiner bisherigen Forschungen

finden wir in den beiden Büchern "Sprachen - vergleichbar und unvergleich¬

lich" - München: Piper 1969; und "Interlinguistik. Umrisse einer neuen Sprach¬

wissenschaft." - München: Piper 1971. Wandruszka hat folgende Sprachen

durch ihre Ubersetzungen verglichen: Deutsch, Englisch, Französisch, Itali¬

enisch, Portugiesisch, Spanisch.

Ich kam nun auf den Gedanken, über den Rahmen indogermanischer Spra¬

chen hinauszugreifen und das Arabische einzubeziehen. So sammelte ich 3

Jahre lang Ubersetzungen aus dem Arabischen und i n s Arabische. Das

Portugiesische konnte ich nicht dazunehmen, weil keine entsprechenden Uber¬

setzungen vorliegen. Dagegen gesellte ich das Maltesische der Schar der zu

untersuchenden Sprachen bei. Das Maltesische ist für mich als Romanisten

besonders interessant, weil sich in dieser Sprache Arabisches und Romani¬

sches getroffen haben.

Es war nicht einfach, die Originalwerke und ihre Ubersetzungen herbeizu¬

schaffen. Ganz wesentliche Hilfe erfuhr ich vom Direktor der Orientalischen

Abteilung der Universitätsbibliothek Tübingen, Herrn Dr. Kümmerer. Dann

reiste ich in meinem Forschungssemester nach dem Libanon, Ägypten, und

Malta, und als kurz nach meiner Rückkehr die Post mir einen ganzen Sack

mit 47 Bücherpaketen zustellte, konnte ich mich ans Werk machen.