Al-Fajr movement and its place in modern Sudanese literature

Abstract

In the year 1934 a coterie of young men launched the literary magazine Al-Fajr and marked the beginning of the first literarily conscious movement in the Sudan. Both movement and initiators have come to be known by the name of the magazine itself. In this thesis the first attempt to study the Al-Fajr group (or movement) has been made. The study investigates the general and special circumstances in which the Group were nurtured, the private gatherings which led to their appearance and the value of their contribution to modern Arabic literature, with particular reference to their critical and poetic works. In chapter one a survey of the Sudanese literary heritage, including popular and classical literature to the appearance of the Al-Fajr group, has been carried out. This chapter provides the necessary literary background to the Al-Fajr movement. Chapter two traces the literary origins of the Group and describes the evolutionary factors which led to their appearance. Chapter three is devoted to a description of the magazine Al-Fajr; its objective and policy, its collection and the general features of its writings. In chapter four the literary ideas of the Group have been examined and the theoretical and practical aspects of their criticism have been studied. The final chapter deals with the poetry of the Group. It attempts to analyse the content of this poetry, study its form and assess its value in terms of innovation and rejuvenation. The appendix is supplementary to the final chapter. It contains the Arabic text of the poems which have been studied in this chapter.