The Arabic Prose Poem: Poetic Theory and Practice (Edinburgh UP, 2021), by Huda Fakhreddine, examines one of the most controversial poetic forms in Arabic: the Arabic prose poem. When the modernist movement in Arabic poetry was launched in the 1940s, it threatened to blur the distinctions between poetry and everything else. The Arabic prose poem is probably the most subversive and extreme manifestation of this blurring, often described as an oxymoron, a non-genre, an anti-genre, a miracle and even a conspiracy. This ‘new genre’ is here explored as a poetic practice and as a critical lens which gave rise to a profound, contentious and continuing debate about the definition of an Arabic poem, its limits, and its relation to its readers. Huda Fakhreddine, Associate Professor of Arabic Literature at the University of Pennsylvania, examines the history of the prose poem, its claims of autonomy and distance from its socio-political context, and the anxiety and scandal it generated.
Miguel Monteiro is a PhD Student in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Yale University. miguel.monteiro@yale.edu.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies
Nuzhat Abbas, "River in an Ocean: Essays on Translation" (Trace Press, 2023)
Shakespeare in America
Ambereen Dadabhoy, "Shakespeare Through Islamic Worlds" (Routledge, 2023)
Anusha Rao and Suhas Mahesh, "How to Love in Sanskrit" (HarperCollins, 2024)
"Orion" Magazine: A Discussion with Sumanth Prabhaker
Karen Sullivan, "Eleanor of Aquitaine, As It Was Said: Truth and Tales about the Medieval Queen" (U Chicago Press, 2023)
Inhuman
Sony Coráñez Bolton, "Crip Colony: Mestizaje, US Imperialism, and the Queer Politics of Disability in the Philippines" (Duke UP, 2023)
Courtney Thorsson, "The Sisterhood: How a Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture" (Columbia UP, 2023)
Scott W. Gregory, "Bandits in Print: The Water Margin and the Transformations of the Chinese Novel" (Cornell UP, 2023)
Siân E. Grønlie, "The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts: Translation, Exegesis and Storytelling" (Boydell & Brewer, 2024)
Yasmine Ramadan, "Space in Modern Egyptian Fiction" (Edinburgh UP, 2021)
Gina Sipley, "Just Here for the Comments: Lurking as Digital Literacy Practice" (Bristol UP, 2024)
B. J. Woodstein, "Translation Theory for the Practising Literary Translator" (Anthem Press, 2024)
Kendra Y. Hamilton, "Romancing the Gullah in the Age of Porgy and Bess" (U Georgia Press, 2024)
Steve McCauley excavates John Cheever's "The Five-Forty-Eight" (JP)
What do the PDFs say about this?: Brandon Taylor and Stephanie Insley Hershinow (CH)
Book Banning: A Discussion with Christine Emeran of the National Coalition Against Censorship
Regina Seiwald and Ed Vollans, "(Not) In the Game: History, Paratexts, and Games" (de Gruyter, 2023)
Matteo Pangallo and Emily B. Todd, "Teaching the History of the Book" (U Massachusetts Press, 2023)
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
New Books in Philosophy
New Books in Sociology
New Books in Psychoanalysis
Gulliver’s Travels
Great Expectations
New Books in Psychology
New Books in Economics