{"id":6589,"date":"2011-07-20T02:58:12","date_gmt":"2011-07-20T06:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/?p=6589"},"modified":"2011-07-20T02:58:12","modified_gmt":"2011-07-20T06:58:12","slug":"ibn-darradj-al-qastalli-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/ibn-darradj-al-qastalli-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Ibn Darradj al-Qastalli (2)"},"content":{"rendered":"

 
\nOde in praise of al-Mansur al-\u2018Amiri, Emir of Cordoba\u00a0<\/strong>
\n(Mu\u2019arada of Abu-Nawas)(Extract)<\/strong>
\n 
\nO wife! Set the will of the unjustly treated free
\n           so that it may rise into the desert\u2019s immensity and take flight!
\nPerhaps what pained you after separation
\n           will make the lowly stronger or free a prisoner.
\nDon\u2019t you know that to settle down means to die
\n           and that the homes of those who have no will become graves?
\nDidn\u2019t you try to read the early birds\u2019 omen?
\n           Didn\u2019t they fly to the right to tell you the journey would be safe?
\nThis long journey does scare me
\n           though the hope of kissing al-Mansur\u2019s hand sustains me.
\nLet me drink the desert\u2019s stagnant waters
\n           until the pure waters of his nobility will quench my thirst
\nand give revenge for hard times
\n           as I meet the one who will protect me
\nfor the risks that await the one who dares
\n           are also part of his human fate.
\nWhen she came closer to say good bye
\n           her moans & sighs were more than I could bear;
\nshe reminded me of our love and affection
\n           while from the cradle rose a baby\u2019s babble
\nthat sounded like a dumb person\u2019s talk
\n           though it went straight to the heart
\nwhere it settled forever helped
\n           by wide open arms and a soft throat
\nthat make of all noble and beautiful women
\n           breast-feeders for other children and their own.
\nI turned away from my child against my will
\n           to be led on a journey that would last many nights and days
\nand give wings to my ambitions and push me forward
\n           while she yielded to the pain of separation & stepped back.
\nIf she thinks she\u2019s said good bye to a jealous husband
\n           I, too, am jealous of the power of her grief over my resolution.
\nIf only she could see me amid the furnace
\n           of the desert sun and the hallucinations of the mirage
\nunaware of the midday heat burning
\n           my face till late in the blaze of afternoon
\nbreathing searing desert wind
\n           and treading on baking hot stones!
\nIn a coward\u2019s life, death takes on many forms
\n           while for the ear of the brave, fear is but a faint whistle!
\nShe\u2019d then understand that I fear only injustice
\n           and that I have great patience when it comes to grief and pain:
\nlike an Emir who braves the dangers of the desert
\n           and, if scared, resorts to his noble sword.
\nIf only she could see me on the road at night
\n           while my voice keeps the jinns company
\nbraving the desert\u2019s scary darkness
\n           like a lion roaring in a thick forest
\nas the stars start shimmering in the sky
\n           like a virgin\u2019s black pupil eyes in the white of her eye
\nand the polar stars shine high overhead
\n           like crystal cups in a young servant\u2019s hands
\nand the Milky Way in the dark heavens
\n           looks like a young man\u2019s hair turning white \u2014
\nI was resolute in my decision despite the scary night
\n           as the sleepy stars closed their lids,
\nthen she\u2019ll realize that my wishes obey my will
\n           and that I deserve al-Mansur\u2019s affection and generosity.
\n 
\n                      Translated by Fetah Chenni & P.J.
\n 
\nCOMMENTARY:\u00a0<\/strong>
\n 
\n(1)\u00a0<\/strong>Writes Fetah Chenni, the co-translator of these odes: \u201cIbn Darradj is known as the poet of \u2018exile, separation, geographical nomadicity,\u2019 yet he\u2019s never been farther than Ceuta in Morocco and each time he travelled, his family was with him: the man lived more in a nostalgic virtual nomadic world of his own, though he did write excellent poems thanks to this virtual nomadic state of mind. He was a Berber from the Sanhaja tribes, followers of the Sh\u00eea Ali, that were a minority in al-Andalus compared to the Zenata who were powerful allies to the then ruling Umeyad dynasty, though Ibn Darradj never mentions his Berber origins in his poetry. He even stood against those Berber emirs who tried to take over power.\u201d
\n 
\n(2)\u00a0<\/strong>The second ode we present extracts of, dedicated to al-Mansur, the emir of Cordoba, besides being a superb poem in itself,\u00a0 is also a major example of the genre of the emulation, in this case a \u201cwriting-through\u201d (as some of us would say today) of a poem by Abu Nuwas. Beatrice Gruendler, who has analyzed these emulation-poems, writes: \u201cA brilliant military leader and administrator, al-Mansur, a model patron extensively versed in poetry, would put newly arrived poets to test and personally preside over the exams. These consisted of improvisations or emulations of a given model.(\u2026) Ibn Darradj, known as a poetic genius in his own right and credited for his expertise in\u00a0badi\u2018<\/em>\u00a0and virtuosity in motifs, can be expected to realize whatever potential an emulation offered.(\u2026) Abu Nuwas was popular in the East; his poetry became the subject of emulations by Ibn Shuhayd, Ibn Sara al-Shantarini, Abu Tammam b. Rabah al-Hajam and others.(\u2026) Like Abu Nuwas, Ibn Darradj uses the debate with the female character as a transition to the journey towards the praised one. But even within this framework, the poet makes large semantic and structural shifts. The female character is his wife, not an inaccessible beloved, and he introduces the character of an infant son. The wife receives a larger structural role in that the journey is described to her, soliciting her (imagined) approval, whereas Abu Nuwas inserts the journey in the middle of the praise section to show his zeal and exertion in reaching the mamduh\u2026. The longer emulation (in 65 verses) reuses nearly half of the model\u2019s rhyme words (17). Some of these are left in their original context:\u00a0mujir<\/em>\u00a0(Abu Nuwas 34\/Ibn Darradj 32) and\u00a0sarir<\/em>\u00a0(36\/48) both referring to the patron,\u00a0budur<\/em>\u00a0(38\/33) to his ancestors, and\u00a0shakur<\/em>\u00a0(40\/57) and\u00a0jadir<\/em>\u00a0(39\/29) both to the poet, though in the last example, Ibn Darradj makes the wife pronounce him worthy of his patron, while Abu Nuwas had so declared himself. Yam*r (8\/17) in both odes describes the journey, but Abu Nuwas applies it to the melting frost, Ibn Darradj to the undulating mirage in the desert heat.(\u2026)\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Ode in praise of al-Mansur al-\u2018Amiri, Emir of Cordoba\u00a0 (Mu\u2019arada of Abu-Nawas)(Extract)   O wife! Set the will of the unjustly treated free            so that it may rise into the desert\u2019s immensity and...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,91,103,1],"tags":[1025,1024],"class_list":["post-6589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arab-culture","category-poetry","category-translation","category-uncategorized","tag-fetah-chenni","tag-ibn-darradj"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6589"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6615,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6589\/revisions\/6615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}