French Literature Reviews - 2026
B. Hallaq, Gibran and the Renewal of Arabic Literature: Bildungsroman, Prophetic Writing, Transgenericism
Francophone and Oral Literatures
Gibran and the Renewal of Arabic Literature: Bildungsroman, Prophetic Writing, Transgenericism
Boutros Hallaq
Arles: Actes Sud, 2008.
Publisher's description:
Though globally renowned for his English-language bestseller The Prophet, Gibran Khalil Gibran remains one of the true pioneers in modernizing Arabic-language literature.
His work draws deeply upon the indigenous resources of classical and popular Arab culture, progressively embracing universal heritage: the Semitic culture of the Bible alongside ancient Near Eastern civilizations; Syriac and Quranic liturgical poetry; the legacies of the European Renaissance and the Enlightenment; and Far Eastern philosophy. This study highlights the three major trends in Gibran's writing: the Bildungsroman, representing an early manifestation of the European novelistic genre, which anchors all personal and collective development in the centrality of the individual; prophetic writing, inherited from 19th-century European romantic poetry and enriched by a broadly secularized biblical dynamic; and finally, a transgeneric approach—characteristic of both biblical writing and classical Arabic literary prose (adab)—that weaves various traditional and modern genres into a single, cohesive movement.
Through Gibran's Arabic oeuvre, Boutros Hallaq sheds light on the values that inspired generations of Arab intellectuals, most notably the primacy of the individual over all political and religious institutions. Boutros Hallaq, born in 1944 in Yabroud, Syria, holds a State Doctorate in Literature and Human Sciences and the *agrégation* in Arabic. Currently a professor of modern Arabic literature at Sorbonne Nouvelle University (Paris III), he also directs the Centre for Arabic Studies at Paris III.
His other published works include: Histoire de littérature arabe moderne 1800-1945, Actes Sud, 2007 (Volume I co-authored with Heidi Toelle); La Poétique de l'espace dans la littérature arabe moderne, Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2002 (with Robin Ostle and Stefan Wild); Lumières sur Saïda, Desclée de Brouwer, 1994 (with Georges Baguet and Michel Fondo); La Question nationale à l'orée du XXIe siècle, Dar Anahar, Beirut, 1998; and Parler arabe en quarante leçons, Univers Poche, newly expanded ed., 1992.
The study of modern Arabic literature often involves tracing the complex dialogues between indigenous heritage and external traditions, a dynamic clearly visible in the evolution of prose and poetic forms during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Boutros Hallaq examines how Gibran drew upon classical and popular Arab culture, biblical and Quranic liturgical poetry, and European romanticism. Readers interested in the development of modern Arabic letters and the intellectual movements that shaped regional thought may find this volume a helpful contribution to understanding these broader literary currents.
Boutros Hallaq highlights three major trends in Gibran's writing: the Bildungsroman, prophetic writing inherited from nineteenth-century European romantic poetry, and a transgeneric approach that weaves various traditional and modern genres into a single, cohesive movement. Through Gibran's Arabic oeuvre, the author sheds light on the values that inspired generations of Arab intellectuals, most notably the primacy of the individual over all political and religious institutions, while also contextualizing his contribution to the modernization of Arabic-language literature.