NBOCLASSICISM 54
The most striking poem of the more personal and meditative type which
Zahawi wrote was, however, his so-called epic 'Revolt in Hell'. One of the
longest poems, if not the longest, in Arabic (comprising 434 lines), it was
composed in 1929 and first published in Beirut in the periodical al-Duhiir in
- 'Revolt in Hell' was regarded as Zahawi's best work alike by the poet
himself and by many critics and orientalists such as Amin Rihani, Isma'H
Adham, Kratschowsky and Widmer, the last of whom translated it into
German.^78 The poem shows signs of the influence of al-Ma'arri's Epistle on
Forgiveness, and the possible indirect influences of Dante, Milton and Victor
Hugo have been claimed by scholars.^79 It is cast in the medieval framework of
a dream: the poet dreams he is dead and buried. While he is in the grave two
angels appear before him to judge him: they ask him many questions regard-
ing the intricate details of the Muslim faith and all the accretions of supersti-
tion that have gathered round it. When, in impatience, the poet demands
that they should rather ask him questions about things of more value to
mankind, like his ceaseless struggle to promote a recognition of human
rights, his championing the cause of women and his defence of Truth, they
only insist upon testing his knowledge of superstition. Finding him wanting
on that score, they torture him and take him to paradise to give him a glimpse
of the bliss that has been denied him before sending him finally to hell. He
describes heaven and hell in terms derived from the Koran but not devoid of
irony and sarcasm, as in his description of the houri in paradise. In hell he
finds his beloved Laila once more — and here one can detect a faint echo from
the Divine Comedy — as well as the greatest poets, philosophers and thinkers
of all time: poets like Dante and Shakespeare, Imru' al-Qais, 'Umar al-
Khayyam, Abu Nuwas, Mutanabbi and Ma'arri, philosophers like Socrates,
Plato, Aristotle, al-Kindi, Ibn Sina (Avicenna), IbnRushd( Averroes), thinkers
and scientists like Copernicus, Newton, Voltaire and Rousseau, Darwin and
Spencer. Clearly it is only the intelligent and the gifted among the human
species who inhabit hell, and, dissatisfied with their lot, they stage a revolt
against the angels. With the help of the devils, the inhabitants of hell are
led to victory by Zahawi's favourite poet, Abu'l 'Ala' al-Ma'arri, despite his
blindness. Just as they are celebrating their victory over the host of the angels
the poet wakes up from his dream. The influence of Ma'arri's Epistle on For-
giveness is clear throughout and especially in details such as the need to pro-
duce a permit to be admitted into paradise, the miraculous manner in which
live birds are promptly served cooked as soon as the faithful desire to eat
them, and how in hell the poet meets great literary figures who, he thinks,
deserve a better fate, with the result that he questions the justice of his
Creator. Apart from its remarkably vivid descriptions of war in hell, the
poem is most impressive by the tone of irony that runs through it. Here the
