A Critical Introduction to Modern Arabic Poetry

THE PRE-ROMANTICS 80

experimental nature of the poem is stressed by Mutran who in the prose

introduction wrote:

To this day there have not been any long poems dealing with one subject

in Arabic and that is because the need to observe the monorhyme has been,

and still is, an obstacle standing in the way of such attempts. I have there-

fore wished, by making one final definitive endeavour, to ascertain the

extent of the ability of a poet to compose a long poem on a single theme

observing a single rhyme throughout. By reaching the furthermost limit in

my experiment I hoped to show to my Arabic-speaking brethren the need

to follow different methods in order to keep pace with western nations in

the progress which they have achieved in poetry and eloquence.

Clearly this somewhat negative aim of the venture has not been realized, for
it did not discourage Zahawi from attempting an even longer narrative in
monorhyme and monometre in his 'Revolt in Hell' (1929), which, as we have
seen, comprises more than 400 lines. Bearing in mind Mutran's noble aim,
.'Nero' may be regarded as a tour deforce, although the exigencies of mono-
rhyme drove the poet to use, as he apologetically admits, archaic and dif-
ficult vocabulary. However, powerful as it is as an expression of Mutran's
commitment to the ideals of freedom and democracy, it does not rank as one
of his finest achievements. For a poem dealing with so many dramatic events
it is surprisingly free from any dramatic tension. There is no serious at-
tempt in it at characterization or portrayal of conflict or interaction of
characters, but it contains some vivid description, particularly where it deals
with burning Rome. It is of course an indirect political comment, although
there is a direct enough moral, which we are given at the beginning and more
especially in the end where we are told that tyranny is made possible only by
the submissiveness of the people, that tyrants in fact are created by their own
subjects. This is a view which Mutran advocates in his poetry with such
persistence and steadfastness that one critic regarded him as the poet of
freedom par excellence, and another wrote a book on him entitled Khalil
Mutran. the Poet of Freedom.™ Even in his famous poem on 'The Pyramids' he
could not refrain from attacking the tyranny and despotism of the Pharaohs.
It is this dedication to the ideal of freedom that prompted his angry and
courageous comment when in 1909 Sir Eldon Gorst decided to curb the
freedom of the Egyptian press (n,9):

Disperse her best men by land and sea

Slaughter her free men one by one

The good shall remain good till the end of time

And so shall the evil remain