Amman — The Ministry of Culture has published the 42nd issue of Sawt Al-Jeel (Voice of the Generation) magazine, featuring a varied collection of studies, critical readings, and creative texts, alongside interviews, personal accounts, and literary experiences reflecting young people's presence on the Jordanian cultural scene, shedding light on aspects of their creative and intellectual work, within the magazine's continued interest in youth literature, tracking their output and presenting it to readers.
اضافة اعلان
The issue comes within the Ministry of Culture's interest in strengthening the presence of young writers and creatives, introducing their varied experiences, and opening windows for dialogue with Jordanian and Arab literary figures, alongside keeping pace with emerging cultural and literary issues.
The issue brings together critical approaches addressing issues of poetry, narrative, theater, and literary appreciation, alongside creative texts belonging to poetry and prose, presenting a picture of the diversity of youth experience and its directions.
The issue's pages extend to include critical readings and studies addressing issues in poetry, narrative, and theater, alongside creative texts by young Jordanians, ranging between poetry and artistic prose, as well as creative testimonials and literary interviews opening the door to new experiences and voices.
Overall, the issue offers a multi-voiced space for youth writing and literary criticism, combining coverage of new experiences with introducing established literary names and works, reflecting the magazine's approach of following cultural and literary movement, and highlighting youth creativity as part of the Jordanian and Arab cultural scene.
The issue opens with a piece by editor-in-chief Dr. Ibrahim Al-Koufahi, titled "On Arabic Poeticism," in which he discusses the concept of poeticism and its features, addressing a number of issues related to the structure of the poem and its artistic elements, affirming the importance of integrating image, music, language, experience, and vision in building a poetic text, and warning against turning the use of imagery, metaphor, and stylistic shifts into an end independent of the poetic experience itself.
In it, Al-Koufahi addresses the concept of poeticism and its features, criticizing what he sees as excess among some poets of the current generation in employing imagery, metaphors, similes, and stylistic shifts, to the point of making them an end in themselves, rather than tools serving the poetic experience.
Al-Koufahi affirms that the artistic image is merely one element of poeticism, and that a poem's success rests on the synergy of its various artistic and linguistic elements and their harmony in expressing the poet's experience and vision.
He believes that an accumulation of images, imaginings, and stylistic shifts, without deep human experience, a coherent vision, or an artistic context maintaining the text's unity, can turn poetic creativity into mere wordplay.
He notes that Arabic poetry, ancient and modern, offers powerful examples that didn't rely on imagery alone, but were built on the diversity and integration of artistic elements and linguistic techniques. He also points out that imagery and imagination aren't exclusive to poetry, appearing also in the short story, the novel, the essay, and other literary arts, and may be absent from certain lines or passages of a poem without the poem losing its value or coherence.
In discussing the identity of Arabic poeticism, Al-Koufahi highlights regular meter and rhyme as the pillar that distinguished Arabic poetry from prose, explaining that other elements, such as imagery, metaphor, simile, condensation, symbol, and suggestion, can be present in both poetry and prose alike.
He explains that what is technically known as "external music" is tied to the system of meters and rhymes, while what's called "internal music," including repetition, alliteration, and other verbal embellishments, remains an element that can be present in both poetry and prose, without being required to appear regularly throughout every part of the text.
Al-Koufahi affirms that poetry, in the Arabic critical tradition, is literary speech built on metered, rhymed composition, while literary speech lacking this element remains within the realm of prose, however beautiful, eloquent, or impactful it may be. Hence the distinction between poetry and prose, while the rest of the elements of quality and beauty remain shared between them.
He also explains that ancient Arab critics treated meter and rhyme as self-evident matters in defining poetry, then turned their attention to studying its other expressive and aesthetic elements, and ranking poets on that basis. In this context, he responds to some contemporary critical readings that interpret the Arabs' definition of poetry through meter and rhyme as meaning that any metered, rhymed speech is considered poetry.
Al-Koufahi distinguishes between composition with poetic intent and composition used for educational purposes, such as instructional texts and scientific rules, noting that metered educational texts aren't considered poetry merely because their meter and rhyme are regular. In this context, he cites "Alfiyyat Ibn Malik," known as an educational text in grammar and morphology, not a poem in the artistic sense.
The issue includes a number of sections, including "Critical Visions," where Dr. Mohammad Hussein Al-Samaaneh wrote about "A Woman Between Presence and Absence in Untold Stories," while Dr. Omar Al-Amiri addressed "Existential Alienation in the Poetry of Hussam Shdeifat ('He Who Committed Departure' as a Model)," and Musa Ibrahim Abu Riyash wrote about "Developing Literary Appreciation Among Young Creatives." Rabia Abu Snaineh, meanwhile, addressed in her article "Between a Finger Swiping the Screen and an Eye Watching the Curtain Rise: The Value of Closet Drama."
The "Fresh Flowers" section includes seven creative texts by a group of promising young Jordanians, ranging between poetry and prose. In poetry, we find the poem "The Brunette's Lyre in Praise of Zarqa," by poet Mahmoud Diab Al-Maraabeh, the poem "A Memo for a Fictional Assassination," by poet Mohammad Kanaan, and the poem "The Weight of Longing," by poet Ali Muflih Mahasneh.
In artistic prose, we read "When the Masks of Day Fall," by writer Muslim Al-Nabahneh, "Amber Beads," by writer Basma Naeem, "The Carnation Seed," by writer Mohammad Hassan Fayed, and "A Face That Never Fades," by writer Ghada Aql. Poet Dr. Wafa Jabour and poet Amin Al-Rabee also offered two creative testimonials in the section dedicated to that, titled "Mirrors of Letters."
In the "Center of the Issue" section, we read an extended piece on "Youth Literature in Ajloun," prepared by poet Dr. Abdul Rahman Mustafa Al-Qudah, alongside "A Historical Tour of Ajloun's Antiquities," prepared by Osama Al-Amarat.
In the magazine's effort to direct young writers' attention toward established literary figures on the Jordanian and Arab scenes, we read, in the "Bridges" section, a literary interview with Jordanian poet Mohammad Khudair, conducted by poet Mai Al-A'raj.
The "Pulsing Places" section featured, exclusively, emotional reflections by writer Shorouq Radwan, who made the University of Jordan a focal point for both heart and mind.
Expressing the magazine's Arab depth, it dedicated the "Arab Mosaic" section to two articles: the first by Egyptian writer Mohammad Attia Mahmoud titled "More Inner Wildness in ('Who Opened the Ta Marbuta?')," and the second by Yemeni writer Hatem Ali titled "Youth: The Light of the Moment's Dawn."
In keeping with the magazine's openness to developments in digitalization and AI, Sameh Othman Abu Al-Rob wrote an article titled "The Product of Triviality Amid Digital Life," within the "An Eye on the Digital World" section.
It's worth noting that the new editorial board of Sawt Al-Jeel magazine includes Dr. Ibrahim Al-Koufahi as editor-in-chief, Adnan Al-Saudi as magazine director, with members Dr. Hossam Al-Lahham, Dr. Maram Abu Al-Nadi, Sereen Ahmad Al-Ghassawneh, and Dr. Mohammad Mahmoud Mahasneh, while Dr. Sultan Al-Zughoul handles proofreading, and Ghadeer Khairy Mansour serves as the magazine's secretary.
Resource: Al-Ghad.
