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    University of Oklahoma

    Beyond the Notion of Influence: Notes toward an AlternativeAuthor(s): Abdul-nabi IsstaifSource: World Literature Today, Vol. 69, No. 2, Comparative Literature: States of the Art(Spring, 1995), pp. 281-286Published by: University of OklahomaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40151137Accessed: 23/12/2009 01:35

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    Beyond he Notion of Influence: Notes Toward an Alternative

    By ABDUL-NABI ISSTAIF Writing in 1936,1the Syrian/LebaneseArab critic and au-

    thor Khalil al-Hindawi (1906- 76) who was thefirst to introduce he term comparative iterature al-3Adab l-Muqdran) nto the Arabic anguage refersto the Arab philosopher Abu al-Walid Ibn Rushd(known n the West as Averroes) as a pioneer com-paratist n classical Arab culture. According o him,the Arab engagement with comparative iterature, rwhat the French call "litterature omparee," goes asfar back as Averroes 1 126-98) and his commentaryon the Poetics of Aristotle. Yet Arabs' interactionwith Aristotle and other Greek philosophers goesback even further han the philosopher of Cordoba.

    In addition to the earlier translations of Aristotle'sPoetics, both al-Farabi d. 950) or the Second Mas-ter (al-Mu'allim al-Thani), with Aristotle being theFirst Master, and 'Ibn Sina (980-1037), known asAvicenna n the West, are well known in both theEast and West for their original use of Greek philos-ophy. Al-Hindawi was, of course, more interested nboosting the cultural dentity of his nation than inthe historical acts regarding he emergence of com-parative iterature n the Arab world, and glorifyingthe past by reading as much as he liked into his cul-tural heritage was his own way of showing his strongbelief n the glorious past of the Arabs.

    Doubtless, al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and,for that matter, Hazim al-Qartajanni 1211-85) andthe like were no comparatists, lthough their inter-actions with Aristotle and other Greek philosopherscan be studied as extremely mportant and highlysignificant examples of East- West cultural relationsbetween the tenth and thirteenth centuries. Howev-er, the beginnings of comparative iterature, by theconsensus of most scholars, were in fact the out-come of modern Arabic culture's encounter with itsEuropean ounterparts n the nineteenth century.2 Acentury-long confrontation with the West (startedrather overwhelmingly ith the French campaign nEgypt n 1798) has resulted n the spread of a com-parative awareness among Arab writers, critics, andintellectuals. Two important applied comparative

    studies appeared n the first few years of the twenti-eth century. The first, entitled The History f the Sci-ence of Literature of Both the Franks and the Arabs andVictor Hugo by Muhammad Rawhi al-Khalidi(1864-1913), was originally published as a series ofarticles n the Egyptian ournal al-Hildl n the years1902-3 and then as a book attributed o al-Maqdisi(a native of Jerusalem), because of the author's earof Ottoman oppression, before a third edition ap-peared in 1912 under his real name. By all ac-counts, al-Khalidi was the true pioneer of appliedcomparative iterature n modern Arabic culture, orhe practiced he art with just the right qualifications(an excellent knowledge of both Arabic and Euro-pean literatures), abilities, procedures, and results,particularly egarding he Arabic nfluence n Euro-pean poetry and fiction in the European Renais-sance, channeled through Spain and Sicily. Thepublication of three editions n ten years s no doubtan indication of the warm reception accorded o thebook, and probably o the field as well.

    The second important study is Sulayman al-Bustanfs (1856-1925) critical and comparative n-troduction o his translation f Homer's Iliad, whichtook him eight years to write following eight yearsspent on the translation of the epic itself. Consid-ered to be one of the most important documents nthe history of modern Arabic iterary criticism, hisintroduction, which was published with the transla-tion in Egypt in 1904, includes a detailed compari-son between the Greek epic and narrative Arabicpoetry going back as far as pre-Islamic imes. Al-Bustani, who seems to be more interested n point-ing out the similarities s well as the differences be-tween the two, stresses he importance of lyricism nArabic poetry as giving it an advantage over itsGreek counterpart. He furthermore goes beyondthis comparison o offer his reader a more generalassessment of both Greek and Arabic poetry. Whatis most interesting n his comparison s the fact thathe does not relate the affinities between the Greekand Arabic poetic traditions o any notion of influ-ence. Being a meticulous scholar who seems unableto pass any judgments on who influenced whom, he

    reduces these affinities o the fact that both Greekand Arabic societies had undergone imilar tages ofdevelopment, which reminds one of the Soviet andEast European radition n comparative iterature.

    The following two decades saw several isolatedattempts at comparison between Arabic and Euro-pean literatures by both creative writers and criticsfrom various parts of the Arab East. The thirties

    Abdul-Nabi Isstaif is Professor of Comparative iterature ndCriticism t the University f Damascus, Syria. He is the authorof more than three hundred articles, reviews, and translationspublished in some fifty Arabic-language ournals and of fourbooks (all in Arabic): wo volumes itled On Modern Arabic Liter-ary Criticism both 1991), We and Orientalism: The Option of Posi-tive Confrontation 1995), and The Literary Study: Five Approaches(forthcoming).

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    282 WORLD LITERATURE ODAY

    were particularly mportant or the various indica-tions of an increase of Arab interest n and engage-ment with the theory and practice of comparativeliterature. First, there was the publication of severalseries of articles comparing Arabic and Persian iter-ature (by cAbd al-Wahhab Azzam in 1933); dis-cussing the relationships between Dante and theArab-Islamic radition n regard o human journeysto the other world (by Darrini Khashabah n 1936),or those between Arabic and English iteratures byFakhri Abu al-Su'ud in 1936), all appearing n al-Risdlah a weekly published n Cairo between 1933and 1953 under the editorship of the distinguishedwriter, translator, and scholar 'Ahmad Hasan al-Zayyat [1885-1968]). Second came the publicationin Aleppo n 1935 of the third part of the pioneeringcritical work by Qastaqi al-Himsi (1858-1941),Manhal al-Wurrad fi cIlm aWlntiqdd (the first twoparts came out in Cairo n 1906-7), which includes

    an extended study of the relationship between Dan-te's Divine Comedy and The Epistle of Forgiveness by'Abu al-'Ala' al-Ma'arri d. 1057). Although schol-ars differ over its comparative value, this study,which had been in the making or three decades (aswe are told by its author), s still an impressive man-ifestation of the Arab's obsession with this subjectand a landmark n the history of Arabic scholarshipon Dante's Arabic-Islamic onnections. Third, therewas the appearance f Khafil al-Hindawi's our-partarticle in al-Risdlah Cairo) in 1936 in which theterm comparative iterature as first used in modernArabic culture. The title of the article, which is mosttelling, reads as follows: "New Light on an Aspectof Arab Literature: he Arab Engagement with Com-

    parative iterature, or What the Franks Call 'littera-ture comparee' n the Summary of Aristotle's Poeticsby the Arab Philosopher Abu al-Walid Tbn Rushd."

    The 1940s witnessed he introduction of compar-ative literature nto Arab universities Dar al-'Ulumin Cairo was the first college to teach the subject,which was offered o third- and fourth-year tudentsof its Arabic B.A. program) as well as the publica-tion of a few theoretical and applied works by Najlbal-'Aqiqi, 'Abd al-Razzaq Hamidah, and 'IbrahimSalamah. The fifties were crucial years n the historyof comparative iterature n the Arab world, with thelate Muhammad Ghunaymi Hilal (the real founderof Arabic comparative iterature) returning fromFrance with the highest qualifications nd with greatenthusiasm and determination o launch his cam-paign for the cause of the new field of inquiry inmodern Arabic culture. His theoretical works, par-ticularly his Comparative iterature n Arabic (firstpublished n 1953 and later revised, expanded, andreprinted many times all over the Arab world andadapted as a textbook or a major reference work inalmost all Arab universities), still considered to bethe best exposition of the so-called French school,

    as well as his many books in applied comparative it-erature published over a quarter of a century, haveall contributed to the respect and credentials ofcomparative iterature as an academic speciality nArab universities. His writings on the Arabic nflu-ence in Persian iterature, particularly is studies oflove and madness, have not been superseded.

    The sixties and seventies were fruitful years as faras applied comparative tudies are concerned, withimportant works exploring he various aspects of re-lations between Arabic iterature and, for example,Persian, Turkish, Greek, Italian, English, French,and other West European iteratures. Here one canrefer in particular o the works of Lewis 'Awad, aswell as to those of Muhammad Ghunaymi Hilal,Muhammad MufTd l-Shubashi, Husam al-Khatib,Muhammad Abd al-Salam al-Kaffafi, Taha Nada,Badf Muhammad Jum'ah, and Rlmun Tahhan,who all have given a good name to the field. The

    end of the seventies witnessed an important devel-opment in the history of Arabic comparative itera-ture: namely, the introduction of the Americanschool by Husam al-Khatib, who presented t to theArab reader n a three-part xtended article entitled"Comparative Literature Between MethodologicalFanaticism and Humanistic Openness" (publishedin al-Marifah n Damascus n 1979 and later revisedand included in his two-part book Comparative it-erature^ ublished n 1981-82).

    Throughout he eighties and early nineties, com-parative iterature has continued to consolidate itsposition in modern Arabic culture. In addition tobecoming an important and obligatory ourse in al-most all departments f Arabic and other languagesat all Arab universities, comparative iterature hasreceived a big boost in the last fifteen years with thepublication of major works n both theory and prac-tice; the appearance f special comparative ssues ofmajor journals n Syria (Al-Marifah> l-Mawqif al-'Adabi, and AW Adah al-'Ajnabiyyah), gypt (Fusul),and Kuwait (cAlam al-Fikr); he formation of Arab,Egyptian, and Moroccan societies of comparativeliterature; he organization of major conferences n'Innabah, Damascus, and Marrakesh; and finally,the return of specialists n many different anguagesand traditions rom their training n various coun-tries around he world.

    Still, despite this century-long engagement withcomparative iterary tudies in the Arab world,3 de-spite the many theoretical books written in Arabic(Husam al-Khatib counts at least thirty-four ofthem)4 or translated rom other languages (French,English, Russian, Romanian), despite the dozens ofbooks and hundreds of articles, written n Arabic ortranslated from other languages, on all aspects ofcomparative iterature, and despite the remarkableincrease n the number of Arab comparatists rainedin the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Spain,

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    ISSTAIF 283

    Eastern Europe, and the former USSR who havewritten theses, books, and articles in both Arabicand foreign languages, one is struck by the lack ofinterest n formulating n Arab point of view in thetheory of comparative iterature, although the long,rich, and highly complex experience of Arabic itera-ture and its interaction with so many literatures,both classical and modern. Eastern and Western, suniquely helpful in suggesting nsights and notionsthat could enrich the tradition of comparative iter-ary studies and most probably n remedying ome ofits basic shortcomings. t is rather regrettable hateven when an attempt to formulate such a point ofview is made, it does not go beyond the views ofcertain comparatists who have no knowledge what-soever of the Arabic literary radition. Thus, whenthe distinguished Arab comparatist Husam al-Khatib tries to plant the seeds of an Arab point ofview on the field, he remains imprisoned by the

    views of the Americans Henry Remak and ReneWellek. According to him, comparative iteraturehas "what can qualify it to be distinguished as abrand of literary study with a clear character hatbrings t close to scientific and objective approaches,that requires a comprehensive raining, and that hasits own special area namely, that area of exchangesand extensions beyond ocal boundaries, be they (onthe one hand) geographic, inguistic, or national, or(on the other hand) formalistic, connected withartistic creation and other systems of knowledgethat bear on the literary henomenon."5

    One can always blame the wretched state of re-search facilities at most Arab universities, he uni-versity educational system's rather unhealthy over-emphasis on teaching rather than on research, thelack of research nstitutes in the humanities whichcan oversee the production of highly sophisticatedstudies n the theory and practice of comparative it-erature, as well as the failure of Arab society to offerany real incentive to Arab comparatists o carry outsuch studies. However, one can point to several pe-cific reasons hat have been responsible or this lackof interest in theorizing on comparative literaturefrom an Arab standpoint. To begin with, one shouldnote that the usage of the Arabic erm AWAdah al-Muqdran comparative iterature), when first intro-duced in modern Arabic culture in 1936, was of-fered as a word-for-word ranslation of the Frenchterm litterature

    omparee,without any reference to

    the original meaning of the word litterature nFrench, which refers to literary study.6 This literaltranslation f the term was further consolidated andconfirmed n the fifties and sixties, when Arab iter-ary critics and comparatists ecame acquainted withthe American radition (Safa' Khulusi's book enti-tled [in Arabic] Studies n Comparative iterature ndLiterary choolswas published n 1957), translatingthe English term literally without any awareness of

    the earlier and lost meaning of the word literature s"the knowledge or study of literature" which, ac-cording to Rene Wellek, was behind the resistanceto the combination "comparative iterature" and,consequently, the late acceptance of the Englishterm.7 So most readers understood comparative it-erature as a subject which can be studied in thesame way one can study French, English, or Ger-man literature. Since it involves the study of morethan one literature, t is, however, viewed as some-thing higher and more important and sophisticatedthan the study of a national iterature.

    Soon many scholars aspired o work on this sub-ject, to teach it, write about it, be associated with itfor all the prestige it carries with it, particularly nthe eyes of Arab readers or recipients who have beenextremely eager to read any book or article that isconcerned with the foreign relations of their litera-ture and culture, whether written n Arabic or trans-

    lated from other languages. Furthermore, with mostArab universities establishing a course in compara-tive literature, at least on the undergraduate evel,there has been a great need for specialists o teachand write textbooks. When there is no faculty mem-ber qualified or the job, an adjunct eacher or pro-fessor is called upon from a neighboring university,or another aculty member rom the same universityis sometimes asked to undertake he task. In thiscase, the university will be quite content to acceptsomeone who has some interest n other literaturesor simply knows a foreign anguage.

    Still, students need textbooks, and since mostArab universities are overburdened by the hugenumber of students and their library acilities canhardly serve adequately, those unqualified facultymembers will literally ewrite whatever Arabic booksare available n the field and sign them as their own.(Sa'id 'Allush has noted that many Arabic heoreti-cal works n comparative iterature have been repro-ductions of various works written in, or translatedinto, Arabic. These include books by Paul VanTieghem, Marius-Frangois Guyard, Rene Etiemble,Rene Wellek, Henry Remak, and Muhammad Ghu-naymi Hilal.) In other words, a peculiar orm of pla-giarism has been evident in the Arabic theoreticalwritings of the last few decades, and this has beenallowed o continue simply because of the unhealthyforces operating n the academic market.

    What seemed a widespread nterest in compara-tive literature n the Arab world and the warm re-ception of this new field of inquiry has turned nto aview of comparative iterature as something whichanybody can do. So, many unqualified persons havetaken it up, and there is no reason why anybodycannot do so in the future. It does not even requirea knowledge of a foreign anguage or literature, ndnowadays one encounters aculty members rom allover the Arab world who teach, write on, and par-

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    284 WORLD LITERATURE ODAY

    ticipate as specialists n comparative iterary activi-ties such as publications, onferences, eminars, andpublic lectures without the proper qualifications ortraining apart rom the writing and teaching experi-ence which they have gained as a result of certainunhealthy ircumstances n Arab universities)

    As a result of this unfortunate tate of affairs, analmost unchallenged domination of the Frenchschool is an obvious feature of most Arab writings nthe theory and practice of comparative iterature. nfact, even the criticism which has been leveledagainst his school has been an echo of Western crit-ics, be they insiders ike Rene Etiemble or outsiderslike Rene Wellek or Henry Remak. Furthermore,when any attempt is made to overcome the limita-tions of this school, it is inspired by an externalstimulus (the American opposition represented byWellek and Remak, the German theories of recep-tion, or the Soviet and East European objections o

    comparative iterature tself on the basis of theirMarxist understanding of the literary art) ratherthan by certain mperatives esulting from the verynature of Arabic iterature nd its long-standing ra-dition of an extremely rewarding and mutually in-spiring encounter with other literatures ver the lastfifteen centuries. Yet these attempts are isolated anddo not form any cohesive effort to bring about anyreal changes n the frame of reference within whichArab comparatists ave been operating.

    To worsen he situation even further, he ideolog-ical factor also plays an important ole in the orien-tation of Arab comparatists nd in their theoreticalefforts. Thus, each Arab comparatist favors theschool which is more compatible with his or her ide-ology and political nclination. deology all too oftendetermines he subjects which are treated by Arabcomparatists. While a nationalist or a traditionalistconcentrates on studying the Arabic influence onother iteratures, e they European or Eastern, clas-sical or modern, a Marxist prefers o discuss Arabicliterature's debt to Soviet or other socialist litera-tures. By the same token, a Western-oriented om-paratist would be more interested in showing theimpact of West European iteratures n Arabic iter-ature and criticism n order to serve his Western-inspired model of development and life in general.In addition, the cultural ormation of the compara-tist and his or her knowledge of foreign anguage s)will affect the choice of subject matter and ap-proach, and, since teaching oreign anguages s stillviewed within the context of the colonial experienceof most Arabic countries, one can imagine the diffi-culties encountered by Arab educational nstitutionsin their endeavor to make their students acquireproficiency n a foreign anguage and the impact thishas had on training Arab comparatists.

    Having presented a rather brief account of thestate of the art of comparative iterature n the Arab

    world and the consequent ack of productive effortin the theory of such a field of inquiry, approach,subject of study, discipline, perspective, or what youwill, I would like to add a few remarks which mightbe helpful in formulating an Arab point of view inthe comparative tudy of literature. Drawing on myexperience in teaching, research, and writing overthe last two decades, I feel that comparative itera-ture is best understood as an endeavor to identifyand account for the presence of the other n the liter-ary work of art, and consequently consider t to bea necessary or even inevitable approach dictated bythe nature of the literary ext under consideration.Confrontation and encounter between the self andthe other in the arts afford the two parties a spacefor contact or interaction, and this inspires a changein both sides on a certain evel, a change which canbe detected by the literary ritic in the literary workof art and can later be pursued and studied n detail

    so that a deeper and more comprehensive under-standing of such a work becomes possible. What isimportant n this study is not so much to determinewho influenced whom, or which of two works s in-debted to the other, as to understand he whole ofthe literary work of art or its totality in otherwords, to cover all possible aspects of this work, in-cluding the presence of the other in it. Therefore,the notion of inspiration might serve as a proper al-ternative to that of influence, and the task of thecomparatist becomes the study of the change s) in-spired by an encounter or confrontation hat hastaken place between the self and the other in a par-ticular space. The self-centeredness urrently pre-vailing in most schools and trends of comparativestudies would make room for the understanding fthe other as the first necessary step toward under-standing he self as a whole, including he presenceof this other in the self or any awareness, articula-tion, or representation f this very self. Here therewill not be any talk about any party that has anupper hand or that is giver, ender, active, affecting,or dominating, et cetera. By the same token, thereshould be no lower hand, taker, or borrower, nopassive, affected, or dominated parties. Viewed inthis way, no participants n the relationship etweenthe self and the other would object to being inspiredto undergo a change in one aspect or another of itsmultifaceted, multilevel, and multidimensional tate.

    Studying the presence of the other in the verbalart of articulating n awareness or representation fthe self or in a literary ext should take the five fol-lowing points into consideration. 1) The literary extitself should be the starting point in any compara-tive study of literature. Therefore, the comparatistshould take the lead from this text by looking or in-ternal or textual evidence hat points to the presenceof the other in such a text, because it is only thepresence of this other which dictates he adoption of

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    ISSTAIF 285

    a comparative pproach o this text rather han anyother approach. This presence might take all sortsof forms, and only a close analysis of the text will re-veal such a presence. In other words, comparatistsmust be literary critics in the first place, if they areto perform his specific function of approaching hisparticular ext from a comparative perspective inorder to cover this specific aspect of the textnamely, he presence of the other n it.

    2) The establishment of the internal evidence ortextual evidence should be followed by a keensearch or external or extratextual vidence that fur-ther supports he presence of the other in the text.In fact, this search will help the comparatist under-stand better the internal or textual evidence as wellas the form and function of the presence of theother n the text. 3) Both the internal or textual evi-dence and the external or extratextual evidenceshould be situated in its signifying context, which

    can reveal the importance of the presence of theother in the text and the function it is performing.The place and time circumscribing he presence ofthe other will help us understand why this particularaspect of the other has been chosen and hosted,what sort of needs it meets, and what function it isperforming n the text. In constructing his context,the comparatist draws on the cultural ormation ofthe writer or producer of the text as well as on thecultural and intellectual history of contact betweenthe nation or collective dentity of the self and thatof the other.

    4) The literary ext, as stated earlier, must be thepoint of departure n any comparative tudy. It mustbe, therefore, a part of the verbal art of the nation orthe collective dentity of the producer of this text. Inother words, its literariness r what distinguishes tas literary or as art form is very important, ndeedessential. The act of comparative tudy must be per-formed on a literary ext worthy of such a study onaccount of its literary merits, notwithstanding hechanges of fortune and status that such a text mightundergo. Furthermore, we are talking here about acritical act performed by a literary critic and notsimply by a cultural historian or a historian of ideas.In short, the act of comparative tudy must be per-formed within the framework of a critical systemthat implies judgment and a sense of value, other-wise it becomes a mere set of procedures or simply amechanical act whose content, subject matter, andobjectives are value-free.

    5) Finally, the literary ext must be viewed as awhole and should be studied as such. Concentratingsolely on the presence of the other in the text givesus only a partial assessment of such a text and mightbe counterproductive n the sense of overlooking heoverall mportance and significance of this text. Inother words, the literary ext must be considered asa coherent signifying ystem and the presence of the

    other as merely one sign of this system of signs.Naturally, we should not forget that the presence ofthe other or the new sign has been, up to its integra-tion in the new system, a sign in another ormer ys-tem that belongs to the other or to his/her collectiveidentity. So when a sign is transferred rom one sys-tem to another, it undergoes a transformation hatresults from the conflict between the two sign sys-tems at work within the space of encounter betweenthe self and the other. The fusion of the two signify-ing systems into one and the simultaneous ntegra-tion of the one sign that stands for the presence ofthe other nto the new system or the text are he mech-anism of the production f the new meaning or signifi-cation carried y the new text or the new signifier.

    This proposed comparative study of literature,which takes account of the foregoing five points,might be illustrated by a brief discussion of "AWoman and a Statue," a short lyric by the distin-

    guished Arab poet from Syria, the late 'Umar 'AbuRishah (1908-90).A Woman and a Statue

    O beautiful one! Behold this statue carved of marble,Looking down on the world with cynical disdainAnd traveling by night across the ages to the sanctuary of im-

    mortality.Naked, intoxicating the imagination with her arrogant naked-

    ness;Eternally enjoying the gushing spring of youth;We gaze upon her with the wonder of the questing dreamer,And the eye moves across her magic, lingering, entranced.The sculptor's creativity made of her an adornment to the ge-

    nius beauty,Then passed away, while the daughter of his vision remained,

    youthful and unchanged.O beautiful one! How cruel are the sudden blows of crooked

    time!If you change, I fear that my vision may die ... so turn your-

    self into stone!8

    The reader of this poem will easily notice that themarble statue, described n detail by 'Abu Rishah,supersedes not only the natural and human stan-dards of beauty but also the supernatural nd super-human as well, for it is capable of a) intoxicating heimagination, b) making even the dreamer doubtfulof what he is seeing, c) beautifying he genius beau-ty, and d) eternally enjoying the gushing spring ofyouth. Yet the statue is still the creation of a meremortal human being, a sculptor who has alreadypassed away, leaving behind the embodiment of hisartistic vision,

    youthfuland

    unchanging.At the

    same time it is a statue of the goddess Venus, whoenjoys the power of creation or at least of injectinglife into the statue (Pygmalion).

    Discussing the creation of man in this fashion nan Arab society dominated by a monotheistic viewof the world is obviously a violation of the psycho-logical and religious sensibilities of that society, andthis requires an explanation. Compared o the stat-ue, the beautiful lady, who, according to 'Abu

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    Rishah, represents he highest ideal of beauty andwho also is seen by him as the embodiment of hisartistic vision, is only a human being. She is there-fore subject to the human law of inevitable changeand eventual death. Faced with this reality, he poetcan only make her escape this rather harsh fate byasking her to turn into stone (into art). Consequent-ly, he risks he estrangement f his audience and theviolation once more of its artistic sensibility, or noreader would ever expect a poet to ask a humanbeauty to turn into stone. In fact, it is exactly theopposite which is expected of him, particularly nthe context of Arab-Islamic ulture.

    Upon close examination, his dual violation of thepsychological and artistic sensibilities of society by'Abu Rishah, who served as a distinguished ambas-sador for his country on three continents and formany years, is all the more unexpected. This raisesthe question of why such a poet seeks to estrange hisaudience n this

    wayand

    whyhis

    sensibility,as ex-

    hibited in this text, has undergone such a change.Reading he text over and over, the reader eels thatthere is something n it which belongs to a differentworld altogether, and the last word of the poem,"Tahajjaii" turn into stone), and its introduction,which refers o Venus' statue, point to this world. Itis the world of Pygmalion. Having seen his belovedten years after he knew her as the highest ideal ofbeauty, the poet, as he writes in his introduction,was disappointed, and when he went home the firstthing he saw there was the statue of Venus. Thismade him enter the world of Pygmalion and con-template his own experience n terms of this myth inits Latin version (the reference n the introduction s

    to Venus rather han to Aphrodite). So we have a)specific internal or textual evidence ("turn intostone") which points to the world of the other Pyg-malion); b) external or extratextual evidence (thestatue of Venus) which also refers to this other; c)the cultural ormation of this poet, which confirmshis acquaintance with the culture of the other,namely Ovid's Metamorphoses, hich includes themyth of Pygmalion. All this indicates an obviouscase of encounter between the self ('Abu Rishah)and the other (the myth), an encounter which in-spires a change in the sensibility of the self in han-dling the relationship etween time and art. Howev-er, the encounter has taken place in a specificcontext, and this, in addition to other factors(namely, 'Abu Rishah's views on art, women, life,and religion), made the poet turn the myth upside-down and ask the human beauty to turn into artrather han the other way around.

    Taking into consideration his specific context,the frame of reference, and the state of mind inwhich 'Abu Rishah was operating, here was no wayin which he could use the presence of the other ex-

    cept in this fashion. First, the human beauty repre-sents the embodiment of his artistic vision, which hewould like to see remain eternally alive. Second,'Abu Rishah is a Muslim poet living in, and ad-dressing, a Muslim society, and he could not allowin any way a creation of man the statue to super-sede human beauty or the creation of God. There-fore he is obliged to secure an immortal ife for hisbeloved. Hence his strange request of her to turninto art. We should remember, however, hat his re-quest comes when she is at the peak of absolutebeauty, since any step forward means a decline inher beauty, and he can never allow this to happen.

    Thus 'Abu Rishah was in harmony with his viewson art, life, God, and society. He was himself, to theutmost extreme, even when he was articulating hepresence of the other in this self. In short, turningthe myth of Pygmalion upside-down was an originalcontribution oward understanding he self of a cre-ative

    poetwho was

    deeplyinvolved n the life of his

    society, nation, and heritage. It was a superb mani-festation of the fruitfulness of encounter betweenthe self and the other, affording he poet this spacein which the two signifying ystems of the myth andhis own world view were capable of producing henew text with its new and original meaning. Thepoet succeeded n his attempt at fusing the new signinto the new signifying system of his poem and atproducing he new meaning of his own Pygmalion.9

    University of Damascus

    1See Khalil al-Hindawfs four-part article in al-Risdlah(Cairo), 4:153-56 Qune 1936), pp. 8-29, as well as Husam al-Khatib's discussion of al-Hindawfs pioneering ole in his article

    (in Arabic) "Arabic Comparative iterature: he First Title andthe First Text," Fusul Cairo), 9:3-4 (February 991), pp. 265-75.2For more information n the impact of this encounter, seeM. M. Badawi, A Short History f Modern Arabic Literature, x-ford (Eng.), Oxford University Press, 1993, pp. 1-18.3For the best short history of Arabic comparative iterature,see (in Arabic) Husam al-Khatib, The Pan-Arab nd InternationalHorizons f Comparative iterature, eirut, Dar al-Fikr l-Mu'asir,1992, pp.169-239.4See a list of these books n Husam al-Khatib, pp. 241-44.5Ibid., p. 61.

    6Rene Wellek, Discriminations: Further Concepts of Criticism,New Haven, Ct., Yale University Press, 1970, p. 9.7Ibid., p. 3.8See the Arabic text in 'Umar 'Abu Rishah, Diwdn 3AbuRishah, 1971), pp. 315-17. The citation here is a revised versionof M. Khouri and H. Algar's translation n their Anthology fModern Arabic Poetry, Berkeley, University of California Press,

    1975, pp. 156-59.91 owe the writing of this essay to two friends whose encour-agement and interest n the state of comparative iterature n theArab world were crucial n committing hese tentative views topaper n English: Djelal Kadir, Editor of World iterature oday,and John Burt Foster Jr., Review Editor of The Comparatist. helast part of the present ext is condensed rom a lengthy chapterentitled "The Comparative pproach o Literature," n my forth-coming book (in Arabic) The Literary Study: Five Approaches(Damascus, 1995).


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