Essays on Literature and Language (Paperback) | Released: 01 Nov 2014

This book contains twelve selected essays in English and two translations of individual poems by Mahmoud Darwish and 'Abd al-Wahhab al-Bayati. The essays were written for various purposes. In addition, they were written in different places and under different circumstances. Some were delivered as lectures, and some were read at conferences, but all were published in different magazines, blogs, or journals. However, at the insistence of friends and colleagues here in the United States and in Lebanon, I was encouraged to collect them in one volume and make them all readily available. Given the diversity of the reasons that necessitated the writing of these articles, there is no primary theme or line of argument that governs the overall structure of this book. This book is simply a collection of essays on literature and language just as its title states, and each essay in an independent study or chapter in itself. The richness of this book is embedded in the greatness of the authors, poets, writers and critics that it deals with and with the genres and the time periods that it spans from Medieval to Modern Arabic Literature. The authors and poets discussed in this one collection of essays include: Abu Tammam, al-Buhturi, Ibn al-Farid, Gibran Kahlil Gibran, William Blake, T.S. Eliot, Salah Abdel-Sabour, Badr Shakir al-Sayyab, 'Aziz Al-Sayyid Jasim, Ghada al-Samman, Stephen Krashen Mahmoud Darwish, and 'Abd al-Wahhab al-Bayati. This book is like a garden with many trees and much fruit. It is my hope that every reader finds in it a tree with enough shade and interesting fruit to savor and enjoy.
About the Author: George Nicolas El-Hage, Ph.D. is a Lebanese-American poet, professor, linguist, administrator and writer. He was born in Mansourieh El-Metn, Lebanon in 1952. His father was Nicolas Iskandar El-Hage and his mother was Martha Abounader El-Hage. Dr. El-Hage completed his elementary and secondary school education in Lebanon. He acquired his B.A. in Arabic Literature from the Lebanese University in Beirut, Lebanon. While in Beirut, El-Hage studied with and was influenced by poets like Buland al-Haidari and Khalil Hawi. He then emigrated to the United States where he completed both his Master of Arts and Ph.D. in Arabic and Comparative Literature at the State University of New York in Binghamton. His dissertation (later published into a book by NDU Press, Lebanon) was on William Blake and Kahlil Gibran: Poets of Prophetic Vision. He has taught at Yale University, Binghamton University, The Lebanese University, Columbia University, the Monterey Institute of International Studies (a graduate school of Middlebury College) and the Defense Language Institute. His academic career has been equally spent between teaching, authoring, lecturing and administration. Dr. El-Hage is a prolific writer with a perfect command of both English and Arabic languages. His training and expertise in the field of Arabic and Comparative Literature has enabled him to delve into a wide range of topics and areas covering literature, mythology, mysticism, language acquisition, criticism, theology and art. He is a published poet in Arabic, both in Modern Standard and in spoken Levantine Dialect as well as in Lebanese Zajal. He also writes poetry in English and is an accomplished translator. Dr. El-Hage has published seven volumes of poetry, numerous research articles, books on language pedagogy and poetry in Lebanese Dialect and Zajal. His poetry betrays a marked fluctuation between a deep romantic sensitivity and a tragic existential awareness which colors his reading of current universal and regional events. The tragedy of his embattled country constitutes a dominant theme in his writings. El-Hage is a supporter of the free verse movement in Modern Arabic Poetry. Nevertheless, he still appreciates the Qasida 'Amudiyya, the classical form of traditional Arabic Poetry. He always chooses short meters, and his poetry is characterized by its musical effects.