EPILOGUE 265of social and cultural change, the political malaise, the occasional awareness
of loss of direction and of being strangers in an unfamiliar universe, were in
one way or another facts of Arab existence for some time. Whatever be the
foreign influences, at its best Arabic romantic poetry is, therefore, although
more limited in range, no less original than the German which is heavily in-
fluenced by the English, or the French which owes much to both. When, how-
ever, the experience is lacking the result is hollow and slavishly imitative.
An example of such a work is 'From Fukay's Vision',^13 in which the young
Sayyab imitates the style and mannerism of Eliot of The Waste Land, unaware
that style, especially when it is as individual as this, is not an external mould
that can be borrowed, but an expression of a particular vision of life. But when
Sayyab himself has something to say he does not produce such monstrosities,
but works of considerable value such as 'The River and Death'^14 or 'The Book
of Job'." I do not think it would be exaggeration to say that at its best the New
Arabic Poetry has its own original character, which distinguishes it from the
rest of modern poetry. Its contribution lies in the fact that, while it ex-
presses the anxiety and bewilderment of modem man in the face of ultimate
questions, it is deeply concerned about the identity and future of Arab culture
in a tragic age. It is both metaphysical and national at one and the same time.