About this Item
Paperback, primarily in English, xxi + 332 pages, NOT ex-library. A clean and bright copy, with firm binding and unmarked text; free of inscriptions and stamps. Moderate external shelfwear with a touch of sunning and rubbing to edges. -- Writers' understanding of their tasks and the role they should play in society is decisive for the nature of their writing: will they indulge in mere l'art pour l'art, or should literature serve political, social, or moral ends? A prominent question also in the Islamic world, past and present. This book assembles contributions of renowned specialists in the field of Middle Eastern literatures, dealing with modern as well as classical literatures (Arabic, Persian, Turkish), prose as well as poetry, fiction as well as non-fiction and metafiction. Important issues are raised: the self-image of the ancient Arab poet, the emergence of the writer as a public moralist during the 19th century, the reception of the concept of littérature engagée in the Middle East, the role of commitment in the process of nation-building, commitment to a homeland, to Islam, to the cause of humanity, the purpose of writing as appearing in self-reflexive texts, sources of literary inspiration, the importance (and character) of literary 'beauty' and 'quality', the effectiveness of certain techniques such as recurring on archetypes or earlier literary models, etc. -- The series Beiruter Texte und Studien (BTS, 'Texts and Studies from Beirut') places its thematical and regional focus on the Levant. It is considered a platform for interdisciplinary debates pursued by cultural studies and social sciences with the historical background. -- Contents: Anthropological Turn in Some Nineteenth Century Arabic Literature / Nadia Al-Bagdadi; The Poet and His Demon / J. Christoph Bürgel; Mission of the Palestinian Autobiographer / Susanne Enderwitz; Readers as Writers, Fiction as Theory, and Other Confusions: The Metafictional Trickery of Bilge Karasu and Pinar Kür / Priska Furrer; Das Recht auf Dichtung: Orhan Veli Kanik (1914-1950) und Garip / Erika Glassen; A Proposal / Hushang Golshiri; Quelques mots sur Le Roman du Conquérant / Nedim Gürsel; Postmodernism, Apoliticality, 'Settling Accounts': On Ahmet Altan's Dört Mevsim Sonbahar / Stephan Guth; Der Auftrag des Dichters: Sadeq Hedayat über Kafka und über sich selbst / Navid Kermani; Ideals and Reality: The Adaptation of European Ideas of Literary Commitment in the Post-Colonial Middle East - the Case of 'Abdal-wahhab al-Bayati / Verena Klemm; Mahmud Darwish's Re-Staging of the Mystic Lover's Relation Towards a Superhuman Beloved / Angelika Neuwirth; 'Zettelt eure Kriege an, bevor die andern es tun, und folgt mir!': Auf den Spuren des Schriftsteller-Ichs in der Jugendautobiographie Salim Barakat's / Burgi Roos ; Zeugin, Chronistin, Aufklärerin? Zum Selbstverständnis einer zeitgenössischen persischen Autorin / Isabel Stümpel; Najib al-Kilani on His Career, or: How to Become the Ideal Muslim Author / Christian Szyska; Persons as Texts, Texts as Persons in Classical Arabic Literature / Geert Jan van Gelder; The Poet and His Mission: Text and Space in the Prose Works of Mahmud Darwish / Richard van Leeuwen; A Guardian of Change? The Poetry of Adunis Between Hermeticism and Commitment / Stefan Weidner; Bibliography; Index.
Seller Inventory # 004429
Contact seller
Report this item
