Commitment and Beyond: Reflections On/Of the Political in Arabic Literature Since the 1940s

This book is about 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 in recent modern history. It examines historical and contemporary conceptions of literary commitment (iltizam) and how notions of 'writing with a cause' have been shaped, contested, re-actualized since the 1940s until today. Against the backdrop of the current social and political transformations in the Arab world, questions on the role of the arts, specifically literature and its politics, arise with immediacy and require profound reflection and analysis. The chapters reexamine critically both current and historical notions of the political in modern Arabic literature as well as the legacy of iltizam as a term and an agenda. Literary commitment is understood here not just solely as a (completed) period in Arabic literary history but also as a vivid, changing and continuing idea that questions the role of literature and the author in and for a society.

Friederike Pannewick is Professor for Arabic Literature and Culture at the Philipps-Universitat Marburg, Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMS), and co-director of the research field ＂Travelling Traditions: Comparative Perspectives on Near Eastern Literatures＂ within the research program ＂Europe in the Middle East - the Middle East in Europe＂ (EUME) at the Forum Transregionale Studien Berlin and director of the research group ＂Figures of Thought u Turning Points. Cultural Practices and Social Change in the Arab World＂ at CNMS. She is co-editor of the series ＂Literatures in Context: Arabic - Persian - Turkish＂ (Reichert) and has published extensively on modern Arabic literature and theater. Georges Khalil works at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin and is the Academic Coordinator of the Forum Transregionale Studien. He is also responsible for ＂Europe in the Middle East - The Middle East in Europe＂ (EUME), a research program that seeks to rethink key concepts and premises linking and dividing Europe and the Middle East. He was previously the coordinator of the ＂Working Group Modernity and Islam＂ from 1998 to 2006 at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, and studied History and Islamic Studies in Hamburg and Cairo, as well as European Studies at the Europa-Kolleg Hamburg. From 1995 to 1996 he was fellow of the College for International Affairs, Robert Bosch Foundation. Yvonne Albers studied Philosophy, Theater Studies, and Arabic Studies in Leipzig and Damascus. She is currently a Research Associate at the Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMS) at Philipps-Universitat Marburg and a member of the research group ＂Figures of Thought u Turning Points: Cultural Practices and Social Change in the Arab World＂ (DFG). While her former work was concerned with contemporary theater and performance art in Lebanon, she is now writing a PhD on the Beirut-based cultural magazine Mawaqif and post-1967 aesthetic thought. Albers is also co-founder and editorial board member of the open access journal Middle East - Topics & Arguments.