Feminism and Avant-Garde Aesthetics in the Levantine Novel: Feminism, Nationalism, and the Arabic Novel

by K. Hanna

Overview

Writing in response to war and national crisis, al-Samm'n, Khalifeh, 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.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137548702
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	02/23/2016
Series:	Literatures and Cultures of the Islamic World
Edition description:	1st ed. 2016
Pages:	198
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

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

Table of Contents

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 Khalifeh'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

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Feminism and Avant-Garde Aesthetics in the Levantine Novel is a bold and timely intervention in the field of Arab feminist studies, and constitutes an important addition to scholarship on Levantine writers due to its focus on questions of aesthetics, attention to masculinity and sexualities, and openness to a wide range of intercultural critical frameworks, including psychoanalysis and the 'avant-garde.'" - Anna Ball, Senior Lecturer in English, Nottingham Trent University, UK

"Hanna makes important advances in the field of Middle Eastern literary studies by identifying the emergence of a new literary feminism centered on aesthetics rather than simple thematic or chronological typologies. This timely work helps to deepen our cultural understanding of an important but troubled region by raising new literary critical perspectives related to gender, politics and war." - Elisabeth Kendall, Senior Research Fellow in Arabic and Islamic Studies, University of Oxford, UK, and author of Literature, Journalism and the Avant-Garde: Intersection in Egypt

Editorial Reviews

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)

From the Publisher