لماذا تفنى الكلمات؟: الشاعر وصخرته في مراة الشعر الملتزم

Reuven Snir's article "'Why are the words exiled?' The poet and his rock in the mirror of committed poetry" (pp. 49-94) is second part of a study on the issue of iltizam (commitment) in Arabic poetry, as reflected in the work of the Iraqi poet 'Abd al-Wahab al-Bayyati (born 1926). The first part of this study (see Al-Karmel 14, pp. 7-54) examined al-Bayyati's position on this issue in the 1960s, especially as reflected in the poem "Adhab al-Hallaj (The suffering al-Hallaj), which appeared in Sifr al-Faqr wa-l-Thawra (The book of poverty and revoloution) (1965). The present article traces the gradual changes that occured in the poet's view in the late 1960's and 1970's and their metapoetic reflection in his poetry, particularly in 'al-Qurban' (The sacrifice), which was published in Sira Dhatiyya li-Sariq al-Nar (Autobiography of the first stealer) (1974) and 'Qira'a fi Kitab al-Tawsin li-l-Hallaj (A reading of Kitab al-Tawasin by al-Hallaj), which appeared in Qamar Shiraz (The moon of Shiraz) (1975). Snir offers a detailed study of the two poems and presents the intertextual allusions to ancient Sufi poetry and leftist poetry, paricularly that of Pablo Neruda (1904-1973), as well as the intertextual allusions. In addition, he discusses al-Bayyati's attitude to Sartre's view on the role of poetry in society. In the 1960s al Bayyati's work reflects the poet's conviction that commitment is beneficial for society and indispensable for poetry. On the basis of analogies he drows between the committed poet and the mystic martyr al-Hallaj (crucified in 309/922), Snir shows that that position changes in the 1970s, i.e., the poet reaches the conclusion that commitment is by no means beneficial for society, even though for the poet it remains inescapable.