Nationalist concerns in the poetry of Nazik Al‐mala'ika

Interest in the interaction between nationalist issues and literature in the European context has gained momentum in the West only recently (e.g. Newey and Thompson (eds.) 1991, Dixon 1993, Hargreaves 1993 and Hargreaves and Hefferman (eds.) 1993). By contrast, in modem Arabic literature, this interaction as a socio-political phenomenon has been one of the most abiding themes in all genres (Hafez 1992), but no more so than in poetry where generations of poets from different parts of the Arab world have taken upon themselves the task of articulating the nationalist concerns' of the Arab peoples, especially with regard to the Palestinian problem and its multifarious ramifications in Arab social and political life. Of the Arabic publications which deal with this topic (e.g. al-Maqdisi 1950, Husayn 1954, al-Tarabulsi 1957, Jayyiisi 1964, 'Izz al-DTn n.d. and Sharara 1988), none can offer a better overview of this subject than the study by 'Umar al-Daqqaq in his book al-Ittijah al-QawmTfif al-Shi'r al-'ArabT al-Hadlth (n.d.). In this study the author deals with a wide-ranging selection of themes, going all the way back to the first stirrings of the nationalist idea in the second half of the nineteenth century and encompassing some of the most recent examples in this field that have appeared as late as the 1970s. It is interesting to note here that no mention of Nazik al-Mala'ika is made in this work. This is indicative of the overall tenor of the assessments of the thematic content of her work, which generally locate it in the realm of the 'personal' rather than in the arena of issues that are traditionally regarded as of nationalist interest. A similar conclusion is arrived at by Simrin in his work on the poetry of Arab women between 1945 and 1970 (1990).