Abstract
This chapter undertakes an examination of Arab perspectives on Arabic SF (ASF), in conjunction with Western perspectives on the genre, in order to construct a theoretical apparatus for ASF. The chapter begins with the situation commonly called “diglossia”: the language in which literature is written is significantly different from the language(s) people speak. ASF, therefore, always already has an archaic feel, even if it’s written about the future: this colors readers’ reactions to the genre. The chapter next surveys extant works of criticism of ASF by Arabic literary critics, whose preoccupations are rather different from those of Western critics of Western SF. As we move into the twenty-first century, Arab critics’ perspectives begin to address SF theory from the West, but maintain their own terms and structure. The final section of the chapter assembles a theoretical apparatus through which the close readings of formative novels will function. The primary feature of this apparatus will be what I term double estrangement: along with its surface narrative, a work of ASF may also contain a level of political or social critique, and another level wherein it critiques the lack of scientific/technological development or social/moral change within contemporary Arab societies.
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Notes
- 1.
The S and the H are pronounced as separate letters, not a blend.
- 2.
There are certain exceptions: most Egyptian SF novels use the colloquial verb rāḥa for “to go” in place of its formal equivalent dhahaba. More than 99% of the text of these novels, however, is in fuṣḥā.
- 3.
Bakhtin’s work on chronotopes is very popular among Arab critics of modern Arabic literature.
- 4.
He is writing in an issue of Fuṣūl dedicated to the art of storytelling within the novel.
- 5.
His initial example is Johannes Kepler’s Somnium [“The Dream,” 1634], which describes a voyage to the moon and clearly falls within the precursor texts for some Western definitions of SF.
- 6.
It should be noted that “Arabic” and “Islamic” are not synonymous. About 20% of Arabs are not Muslim, and only about 20% of Muslims are Arab. Bahā , however, is clearly arguing from the majority-Muslim Arab perspective, as are most literary critics writing in Arabic.
- 7.
By which I mean the period that began with colonization: in Arabic literature and history, this is generally held to begin with Napoleon’s landing in Egypt with troops and scholars at the very end of the eighteenth century.
- 8.
He is writing in an issue of Fuṣūl dedicated to the question of literary modernity.
- 9.
The word ’irhāṣ can mean “foundation” or “harbinger”; the context provides little clue as to which one Jiyār intends.
- 10.
The word for “innovation”, bid‘a, also means “heresy”. The link between the two is that the normal bounds have been exceeded; the link between “news-gathering” and “prophecy” is more evident (see Cowan, pp. 56–57 and 1100–1105).
- 11.
We will examine Mūsā’s novel in Chapter 7.
- 12.
For an examination of gender roles and misogyny and their codification in jurisprudence at the expense of the spirit of the original community, Fatima Mernissi’s 1991 The Veil and the Male Elite (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley) is an indispensable resource, especially given her use of traditional Islamic scholarship to bolster her critique.
- 13.
He says “European”.
- 14.
See Campbell 2017, pp. 46–47, for a longer discussion of the implications of using words derived from this root.
- 15.
This could also be glossed as “rendered superficial” (Cowan, p. 477).
- 16.
Nāji was a vocal critic of the Egyptian government; this was likely the real cause of his imprisonment. See the PEN Foundation’s justification for giving him an award: https://pen.org/advocacy-case/ahmed-naji/.
- 17.
Consider, because we must, “Make America Great Again”.
- 18.
More accurately, these technologies greatly accelerated a process that had already begun.
- 19.
He notes that many authors of proto-SF, especially in the Western tradition, were themselves scientists.
- 20.
For example, the development of the modern waterbed after its description in several of Heinlein ’s novels, or Elon Musk’s naming his SpaceX ships after spaceships from the “Culture” novels.
- 21.
See, e.g., Saliba, pp. 193–232, for an extended discussion of the Arab/Muslim influence on Copernicus.
- 22.
The original quotation is from Wahba, p. 51.
- 23.
The original quotation is from Shārūni, p. 162.
- 24.
The original quotation is from Rāghib, p. 61.
- 25.
For all that, for example, Neuromancer does so much to estrange the notions of intelligence and humanity, it’s at its root a fairly standard noir detective story.
- 26.
In Arabic, he says al-’adab al-rasmi, “official” or “formal” literature.
- 27.
At this point, he glosses ightirāb, usually “alienation”, as “estrangement” in English.
- 28.
Cf., Laroui’s novel al-Ghurba [“Exile,” 1971]: it is not incidental that the protagonist has exiled himself to Europe.
- 29.
By the middle of the twentieth century, East Asia had also become a locus for development—and, not incidentally, for SF.
- 30.
One salient example of Arab contribution to twenty-first-century technological development is the Sarahah app, which enables its users to receive anonymous messages from anyone who knows their Sarahah username. Sarahah was invented by a Saudi Arabian man; ṣarāḥa is the Arabic word for “candor”.
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Campbell, I. (2018). Criticism and Theory of Arabic SF. In: Arabic Science Fiction. Studies in Global Science Fiction. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91433-6_4
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