Sawn Al-Qareed - Nazarat Al-Rafi'i fi Al-Shi'r wa Al-Shu'ara

Al-Raf'i treated poetry, endured the hardships of his words, then took on criticizing it and its philosophy, so he was insightful about it, knowledgeable of its disputes, experienced in distinguishing its good from its bad, fascinated by revealing its secrets and sneaking into its innermost parts, and setting up scales for poets, judging them by the weights of melody, counting their faults in letters and slips of the mind and stumbles of rhymes, and indicating skillfully the places of their excellence and their slips, with a high explanation, an present argument, a well-timed wit, and a gentle touch sometimes and a firm grip at other times. He derives this from abundant knowledge of rhetorical heritage, from a wide overview of books on the craft of poetry and its criticism, and from a detailed familiarity with the history of Arabic literature in its various stages. He relies on a generous memory and astonishing recall, and on a sharp intelligence that perceives hidden flaws and guides to subtle thefts and reads what hurried eyes do not see, and draws from an insightful eye into the spirit of poetry and what it should be, fighting with a sword of talent and innate fiery readiness. No wonder that his heritage in these fields is a joy for the soul, nourishment for the mind, a polish for taste, and a protection for poetry from tongue-twisting, mental blindness, and opinion instability. In this book, a collection of Al-Raf'i’s articles, introductions to his collections, and his efforts and notes in protecting poetry and defending its pillars, as a philosophy of its truth, and studying some of his poets, and criticizing what did not conform to his method, gathered from his published books, which are the least, and from what he left of his heritage, much of which remains folded in the depths of magazines and newspapers of his time, and is the most. Among the examples of forgotten texts that the book revives and publishes for the first time are: the article "Arabic Poetry," which is the first of Al-Raf'i’s articles that we have received, published in the magazine "Al-Manar" when he was twenty years old, and the article "Comparison between Abu Tammam, Al-Buhturi, and Al-Mutanabbi," and the article "The Reign of Poetry," and articles criticizing "Al-Umariyah" poem by Hafiz, among others. Author: Abdulrahman bin Hassan Qaider Number of pages: 424