The "Crisis" of Contemporary Arabic Poetry: A Critical View

Abstract

The crisis of stagnancy and repetition in vision, language, imagery and rhythm, which has befallen the taf ^cila poem – within the overall framework of contemporary Arabic poetry movement – has led, since the sixties of the twentieth century, to a state of boredom and "aesthetic fatigue".  This crisis is not alien to poetry movements in the past and present.  Nor was it isolated from the crises of modernism with its several internal problematic issues.  It has always been the crisis of stagnation and boredom.  The major poets, such as Mahmud Darwish, have faced the crisis through freeing themselves from a rigid poetic pattern and widening the horizons of their vision and cultural repertoire in the direction of a universal outlook.  The emerging model of artistic performance has moved away from direct style, and the taf ^cila poem tended towards a soft rhythm, balancing poetic and prose techniques in a milieu of concentrated symbolism.