Conditions of malnutrition, conflict, or a combination of both characterize many Arab countries, but this was not always so. As in much of the developing world, the immediate post-independence period represented an age of hope and relative prosperity. But imperialism did not sleep while these countries developed, and it soon intervened to destroy these post-independence achievements. The two pr…
This book is about the relations between literature, society and politics in the Arab world. It is an attempt to come to terms with the changing conceptualizations of the political in Arabic literature (and to a certain extent theater and the visual arts) in recent modern history. It examines historical and contemporary conceptions of literary commitment (iltizām) and how notions of ‘writing…