Part 14 (1/2)
[180:A] _Zwei Abhandlungen uber d. Aristotleische Theorie d. Drama._
[182:A] This work has never been completely published. Dr. B. Halper, of Dropsie College, Philadelphia, has promised us a complete translation from the Arabic ma.n.u.script. There is a synopsis of it by Schreiner in the _Revue des Etudes, Juives XXI, XXII_.
[183:A] See Isaac Husik's _Medieval Jewish Philosophy_.
[184:A] F. C. Prescott's _Dreams and Poetry_ is a magnificent essay on the subject.
[187:A] I do not however agree with Bergson, who does not believe poetry can be composed in dreams at all.
[193:A] ”Poetry is the most emphatical language that can be found for those creations of the mind 'which ecstasy is very cunning in.'” Hazlitt _On Poetry_. ”The imaginative faculty (has) the capabilities of ecstasy and possession.” Lowell, ”The Imagination.” _The Function of the Poet._
CHAPTER XI
LOVE ECSTASY IN ARABIAN POETRY
Oriental poetry, especially that of the Arabs and the Persians, is notable for its interpenetration with ecstasy couched in intricate conventional forms. The Oriental poems abound numerously in far-fetched figures of speech, and are written in metres following definite laws and are subject to difficult and uniform rhymes continued in every line in poems of great length. In fact the greatest historian of the Mohammedans, Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), defined poetry as effective discourse based on metaphor and descriptions, divided into verses agreeing with one another in metre and rhyme, each verse having a separate idea, and the whole conforming to old Arab models. A poet was supposed to get many thousands of verses by heart before practicing his art. One of the chapters in Ibn Khaldun's famous _Prolegomena_[203:A] or introduction to his history, _Book of Examples_, has a t.i.tle stating that the art of composing is concerned with words and not ideas.
But in spite of slavish adherence to technique it was taken for granted that ecstasy was the main object of poetry. There is probably more ecstasy in the poetry of the Arabs and Persians than in that of most other nations, and it is an ecstasy that breaks through the molds of form. It is a matter of astonishment that the artificial forms did not utterly choke out the ecstasy. Professor Edgar G. Browne in his scholarly _Literary History of Persia_ has devoted the first chapter of the second volume to Persian metres and he calls attention to the conventional metaphors, bombast and inflation of the Arabic poets who were not without influence upon the Persians.
We today may accept the definition of poetry given in the _Four Discourses_[204:A] (1162) of Nidhami I Arudi, for though he also believed in the importance of the trappings of verse, he had ecstasy primarily in mind. He defined poetry thus:
Poetry is that art whereby the poet arranges imaginary propositions, and adopts the deductions, with the result that he can make a little thing appear great and a great thing small, or cause good to appear in the garb of evil and evil in the garb of good. By acting on the imagination, he excites the faculties of anger and concupiscence in such a way that by his suggestion men's temperaments become affected with exaltation or depression; whereby he conduces to the accomplishment of great things in the order of the world.
What more effective definition could there be of the utilitarian power of art to take man out of himself and exalt him into a state of beneficial ecstasy?
Ibn Khaldun said:
Poetry is, of all the forms of discourses, that which the Arabs regarded as the n.o.blest; they also made it the depository of their knowledge and their history, the testimony which would attest their virtues and faults, the store-house in which were found the greater part of their scientific views and their maxims of wisdom. The poetic faculty was as much deeply rooted in them as in all the other faculties they possessed.
He continues, that they have handled poetry so well, that one could deceive oneself and believe that this gift, which is really an acquired art, was with them an innate one.
These remarkable words of Ibn Khaldun will help us to understand the famous saying that poetry was the register of the Arabs. Never before nor since has poetry been so interwoven with a nation's life. The stories of the compet.i.tions for prizes for composing poetry, of the happiness when a poet was born, of the importance a.s.sumed by the discussion and recitation of poetry among all cla.s.ses, read to us like myths. Yet the fact that poetry should be part of the life of a pa.s.sionate people who lived in the desert, free and untrammeled, is not strange. The Arabs themselves attribute also their great superiority in poetry to the beauty of their language, especially as spoken by the Bedouins in the desert. The great Arabian poet Abu Nuwas completed his education by sojourning a year among the Bedouins.
Another factor enhancing their poetry and one not to be ignored is that after 622 A.D. in post-Islamic times, poetry was rewarded by gifts.
Hence the eulogy grew into prominence and the poets were fabulously rewarded for their poems. This, of course, led to fulsome and cringing eulogies. The caliph was the patron. When Mohammed appeared it seemed that poetry would die out, but it flourished more than ever. It was only after the Abbasid caliphate was exterminated by the Mongol invasion (1258 A.D.) that poetry declined in Arabia to such an extent that, as Ibn Khaldun says, no prominent man would deign to devote himself to it.
Although the Arabs excelled in various kinds of poetry, we think of them primarily as love poets.
The Arabs, as we gather from _The Arabian Nights_, were a people especially devoted to tenderness in love. When the Arab was smitten with love he was a helpless weeping child. There was one tribe, that of Azra, wherein the victims were said to die of love. One poet said he knew of thirty young men whom love sickness carried off. In answer to a reproach for this weakness, one of the tribe replied: ”You would not talk like that if you had seen the great black eyes of our women darting fire from beneath the veil of their long lashes, if you had seen them smile and their death gleaming between their brown lips.” (Stendhal: _On Love_, p.
218.)
Arabic poetry in the period before Islam between 500 A.D. and 622 A.D.
did not consist of pure eroticism. Satire, eulogy, elegy, revenge, martial feeling, chiefly characterized it. Many poems were also devoted to the praise of animals and the description of nature. The odes or Qasidas, however, began with a love prelude, called nasib, in which the poet dwelt on his love sorrows merely to win the hearts of his hearers to his chief theme. One of the best of these is that in the ode of Imru'ul Qays the first and greatest of the seven poets of the _Muallaqat_.
Pure erotic poetry appeared after Islam with the luxury that spread with the growth of wealth, but the nasib continued to be used, especially in eulogies. The poets still wrote like the Pre-islamic poets instead of celebrating Islam. The Umayyad Dynasty, which extended from 661 to 749 A.D., saw the birth of pure love poetry celebrated not as introductory or episodic but purely for itself. The love story of one of the Arabian erotic poets of the period, Majnun, was celebrated by the great Persian poet, Nidhami, who flourished in the twelfth century. His _Laila_ and _Majnun_ has been translated into English by Mr. Atkinson. The story was retold by many Persian and Ottoman poets. Then there was Jamil, who was the lover of Buthaina. These love poems by Majnun and Jamil were of popular origin, and represented the spirit of the people. There were many other love poets, while some did not devote themselves exclusively to love.
The most celebrated, however, of the love poets was the handsome wealthy Omar ibn Abi Rabia (643-719 A.D.). He was of the tribe of Koraish, the same tribe to which Mohammed himself belonged. This tribe was famous for many things, but not for poetry until Omar took away the reproach. His poems were called a crime against G.o.d, yet a cousin of the prophet memorized some of them. The fullest account of him in English and of his love affairs, with translations from a few of his poems, appears in an essay by William G. Palgrave in _Essays on Eastern Questions_. Omar was united in marriage to his love Zeynab after a stormy courts.h.i.+p, opposed by her people, but he had several love affairs. The best idea of the sweetness and pathos of his love poetry is conveyed without further comment by giving two translations made by Mr. Palgrave.
Ah for the throes of a heart sorely wounded!
Ah for the eyes that have smit me with madness!
Gently she moved in the calmness of beauty, Moved as the bough to the light breeze of morning.
Dazzled my eyes as they gazed, till before me All was a mist and confusion of figures.
Ne'er had I sought her, and ne'er had she sought me; Fated the love, and the hour, and the meeting.