Feminism and Avant-Garde Aesthetics in the Levantine Novel

Writing in response to war and national crisis, al-Samm?n, Khal?feh, Barak?t, and others introduced into the Arabic literary canon aesthetic forms capable of carrying Levantine women's experiences. By assessing their feminism in such a way, this book aims to revive a critical emphasis on aesthetics in Arab women's writing.

The most important achievements of this book is its successful balance between the encyclopedic scope required to prove the existence and the importance of a literary movement and the close readings necessary to demonstrate the movement's avant-gardism. Hanna's Feminism and Avant-Garde Aesthetics in the Levantine Novel represents a valuable intervention in Arab feminist studies, Arab modernist studies, and trauma studies. (Rania Said, H-Levant, networks.h-net.org, August, 2017)

Auteur

Kifah Hanna is Assistant Professor in the Department of Language and Culture Studies at Trinity College, USA.

Texte du rabat

Feminism and Avant-Garde Aesthetics in the Levantine Novel examines the aesthetics of existentialism, critical realism, and surrealism in contemporary feminist literature in the Levant. It focuses on the novels of the Syrian writer Gh?dah al-Samm?n (b. 1942), the Palestinian Sahar Khal?feh (b. 1941), and the Lebanese Hud? Barak?t (b. 1952) and argues that their mediations of the Lebanese Civil War of 1975-1990 and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (especially since 1967) led to the development of a feminism specific to the Levant through avant-garde literary aesthetics. Writing in response to war and national crisis, al-Samm?n, Khal?feh, and Barak?t introduce into the Arabic literary canon aesthetic forms capable of carrying Levantine women's experiences. By assessing their feminism in such a way, this book aims to revive a critical emphasis on aesthetics in Arab women's writing. Moreover, by setting literary representations of gender and sexuality in both national and regional contexts, it highlights 'the Levant' as an interstitial space that inspired new forms of Arab feminism.

Contenu

Introduction: Gender, Nation, and War: A New Critical Conjunction

1. The Vicious Cycle: Contemporary Literary Feminisms in the Mashriq
2. The Gendered Subject: Literary Existentialism in Gh?dah al-Samm?n's "Beirut Tetralogy"
3. Sahar Khal?feh's Resistance Literature: Towards a Palestinian Critical Realism
4. Gender Dialectics: Hud? Barak?t's Aesthetics of Androgyny
   Afterword: Women Writing War, A Levantine Outlook