The Poetics of Postcolonialism: Two Qasidahs by Ahmad Shawqi
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THE POETICS OF POSTCOLONIALISM: TWO QASIDAHS BY AHMAD SHAWQI European colonial interest in the Arab lands is generally assumed to have begun with Napoleon Bonaparte's invasion of Egypt in 1798. Although Bonaparte's expedition proved short-lived, nonetheless it marked the begin- ning of the progressive subjection by the major European colonial powers of much of the Arab lands. With its occupation of Egypt in 1882, colonialist Britain entered into a relationship with its Arab Others which can be charac- terized as a relationship of power and powerlessness.' In this paper I argue that from the onset of colonialism Arab subjects strove to subvert and to de-legitimize this relationship and to effect alter(native) power relationships. Arab poets utilized the traditional Arabic qasidah form to interrogate what critics have called "the textuality of Empire,"' and to mobilize a collective response to colonialism. This paper will engage two Postcolonial qasidahs3 An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Middle East Studies Association in Providence, Rhode Island, Nov., 1996. It was read by Professors Jaroslav Stetkevych of the University of Chicago and Suzanne Pinckney Stetkevych of Indiana University who contributed many important comments and suggestions. My indebtedness to both of them is hereby gratefully acknowledged. ' The word "Arab" is used throughout this study to refer to the inhabitants of the geo- graphic region known today as "the Arab World" who speak Arabic and most of whom subscribe to the ethos of either Christianity or Islam. Some scholars have maintained that Egyptians did not identify themselves as Arabs at the turn of the century. Yet here is Ahmad Lutfi al-Sayyid, the pro-British Egyptian nationalist, writing in his newspaper, Al-Jaridah, as early as 1907 in support of the efforts to hold a farewell ceremony for the retiring Lord Cromer: "But the character of Lord Cromer, the position he holds, the tie that exists between the Egyptian nation and his nation, and the need for harmony in the relations between the two nations in the interest of both, all of this should dissuade us from obstructing [the holding of] a farewell ceremony for him, from obstructing the honoring of his having been a guest [sic], and sending him off as required by national amicability and Arab generosity" (Al-Jaridah, No. 44, April 30, 1907). Lutfi al-Sayyid's invoking the concept of Arab generosity indicates that his readers, the Egyptian reading public, identified themselves, at least to a certain extent, as Arabs and that the terms "Egyptian" and "Arab" were not mutually exclusive. See Ahmad Lutfi al-Sayyid, Safahat Matwiyyah min Tdrikh al-Harakah al-Istiqldliyyahfi Misr (Cairo: n.p., 1946) 79. 2 Chris Tiffin and Alan Lawson, eds., introduction, De-Scribing Empire: Post-colonialism and Textuality(London: Routledge, 1994) 1-11. I Of the various definitions of the term Postcolonial I have for the purposes of this study adopted the one proposed by Stephen Slemon. Slemon writes that "the concept proves most useful not when it is used synonymouslywith a post-independencehistorical period in once- colonised nations, but rather when it locates a specifically anti- or post-colonial discursive pur- chase in culture, one which begins in the moment that the colonising power inscribes itself 180 by Ahmad Shawqi (1868-1932), considered by many to be the greatest of modem Arab poets.4 Each qasidah represents a literary-rhetorical response to colonialism, an intervention in the colonial narrative which sought to con- test that narrative's representations of colonialism, to challenge, in the words of Edward Said, "the idea of empire and the cost of colonial rule."5 Qasidah no. 1: "A Farewell to Lord Cromer"6 1. Your own days or the age of Ismd"il? Or are you a Pharaoh ruling the Nile? ." 2. Or are you ruling the land of Egypt by his command Neither consulting nor ever held accountable? 3. You who own the enslaved necks through [brute] force; Have you never sought a path to the hearts? 4. When you departed, the country recited the Shahadah As if you were an incurable disease from which it had recovered. 5. On the day of parting you heaped humiliation upon us; Never was decorum so outraged! . 6. Why did you not consider a show of courtesy After the Premier wove you a wreath of tribute? 7. Look to the courtesy of the Premier and his civility, And you will find the Premier cultivated, noble. 8. In a playhouse built for comedies You acted out tragedies in many acts. 9. In which "al-Husayn" witnessed the cursing of his forefathers And "the blind man," uninvited, took a front-row seat. 10. Cowardice belittled and degraded them; If a man shows cowardice, he will live in ignominy. 11. When you mentioned in [the playhouse] the country and its people How well you acted the role of its death. 12. You announced to us lasting enslavement and unending humiliation And a state that would never see change. ' 13. Did you think that Allah is less strong than you are? That He lacks the power to change and replace? onto the body and space of its others and which continues as an often occluded tradition into the modem theatre of neo-colonialist international relations." See Stephen Slemon, "Modem- ism's Last Post," in Ian Adam and Helen Tiffin, eds., Past the Last Post: Theorizing Post- Colonialism and Post-Modernism (Calgary: U of Calgary Press, 1990) 3. 4 One of the earliest treatments of these two poems is in Ahmad Muhammad al-Hufi, WataniyyatShawqi (Cairo: Al-Hay'ah al-Misriyyah al-'Ammah li l-Kitâb, 1960). The work is a broad historical survey of the major political and social events of the period punctuated with quotations of poems on these events by Shawqi as well as by other Egyptian poets, especially Hafiz Ibrahim. Subsequent treatments have tended to rehash al-Hufi's survey and have made no attempt to engage these texts analytically. See, for example, Mounah A. Khouri, Poetry and the Making of Modern Egypt, Studies in Arabic Literature, vol. 1 (L.eiden:E.J. Brill, 1977) especially pp. 37-102. 5 Edward W. Said, Culture and Imperialism (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993) 200. 6 AlymadMuhammad al-Hufi, Diwän Shawqi, vol. 1 (Cairo: Ddr Nahdat Misr, 1979) 369- 74. For the original, see Appendix 3. All translations from the Arabic are my own unless otherwise noted. .