An Introduction to Arab Poetics by Adonis (review)

An Introduction to Arab Poetics is a collection of the lectures that Adonis originally delivered at the Collège de France in 1984 and is the product of Adonis' long-time research. Adonis' major concerns in these lectures are Arabic poetry/poetics, the history of Arabic poetry, the relation between Arabic poetry and culture, and the vision of Arabic poetry in the modern world. In the first essay "Poetics and the Oral Tradition of the Jahiliyya," Adonis discusses how history plays a significant role in shaping criticism of Arabic poetry. He suggests that the definition of Arabic poetry and its dominant features are relevant to some major historical contexts (where national identity was often under threat). For example, "in the earlier years of interaction between Arab-Islamic and other cultures, in particular Greek, Persian, and Indian … Arabs codified poetic orality" in order to "affirm, preserve, and put into practice the rhetorical and musical specificity of the craft of Arabic poetry, thereby asserting its individual identity and that of the Arab poet" (19–20). The value of Arabic poetry and the criteria of its evaluation went under transformation due to these early cultural confrontations. Cultural influence thus signifies not only the force of how one culture impacts another but also that of how one resists or evades another culture's influence. As Arabic poetry's "individual identity" was at stake, it had to find a way to secure its own "distinctiveness and specificity" (20). Poetic orality became and continued to be a distinctive feature of Arabic poetry in those earlier years because it distinguished Arabic poetry from the poetry in the nearby cultures, such as Greek, Persian, and Indian. Poetic orality thus contributed to Arabic cultural identity.

Arabic poetry featuring poetic orality is a response to the potential intrusion of nearby cultures. Thus, criticism seeks to identify the difference of Arabic poetry, maintain its "individual identity," and consequently safeguard its cultural and national identity. Besides some inner cultural traditions that gave rise to the development of poetic orality as a prominent feature in Arabic poetry, the historical response to the threatening influence of the other cultures leads to further solidification of this feature in Arabic poetry. Nonetheless, one of Adonis' major critical points, which is directly stated in the preface of this book, is that the approach of building up "a semiorganic relationship" between Arabic poetry and "the establishment of its religious and social values" actually "imprisoned Arabic poetry within an excessively rigid framework" (9). Placing this idea within the context of the historical development of poetic orality in Arabic poetry during the earlier years, Adonis suggests that criticism privileging poetic orality as a force of resistance and defense could actually set limits on the development of Arabic poetry (32). Adonis' historical observation and his critical ideas together explain that it might first appear reasonable and positive to secure a distinctive feature of poetry in a culture as it faces threat in its encounter with other cultures, but such a strategy has its downside and might turn into a restriction itself. In other words, the response to other cultures' influence turns into a force of resistance, which, while counterbalancing a potential threat, could end up being a constraint of its own cultural development.

In the second essay "Poetics and the Influence of the Qur'an," Adonis argues that reading Qur'an with the emphasis on its poetic orality cannot completely exhaust what the Qur'an has achieved. Adonis celebrates how some critics go farther than privileging poetic orality and identify some significant poetic characteristics in the Qur'an, such as imagery, the "innovative use" of figurative language (45), the "poeticalness" that comes from how meaning is created but cannot be located through "listening" (45), and others. Adonis also emphasizes that it is important to study and interpret the text with reliance on "reason" (45), "intelligence" (45), "deep contemplation, reflection, and subtlety of thought" (48). For Adonis, it is thus significant to understand the...