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The ‘Not-Said’ Versus the ‘Wish-Fulfillment’: A Study of Mahmoud Diab’s Al-Halafit

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Last updated: 05 Jan 2025

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Abstract

The present paper represents a Marxist reading of Mahmoud Diab (1932-1983), a prominent Egyptian playwright and short-story writer. It attempts to examine Diab's al-Halafit (1970 [The Downtrodden]) in the light of Terry Eagleton's concepts of “the not-said" and Frederic Jameson “wish-fulfilment." While “the not-said" is the eloquent silence, the painful material which results mainly from the power struggle between the oppressors and oppressed, “wish-fulfilment" is but a psychogenic device in terms of which the exploited may express indirectly their ideology of desire for social justice. A close reading to al-Halfit drives one to make four points regarding the dramatic achievement of Diab. Firstly, although such two concepts were not in the mainstream of criticism during the time of Diab, he seems to be a professional therapist dramatist in a school established by Eagleton and Jameson. Secondly, he creates a dramatic vision via which he holds firmly his pen to draw a physic portrait of the not-said/wish-fulfilment in order to shed light on the social perplexities. Thirdly, to theatricalize the not-said/wish-fulfilment, Diab adopts Masrah al-Samir as a theatre technique. Finally, Diab represents the not-said/wish-fulfilment through an ideological clash between an elite group and subservient team. To motivate the latter speaks for the socio-psychic deviations that befall them, he produces a theatrical space resonant with commissive, imperative, assertive, and interrogative speech acts.

DOI

10.21608/ejlt.2023.226709.1040

Keywords

Mahmoud Diab, Al-Halafit, Terry Eagleton, Frederic Jameson

Authors

First Name

Usama

Last Name

Raslan

MiddleName

Nabih

Affiliation

English Department, Faculty of Archaeology and Languages, Matrouh Universiry

Email

osamaraslan@mau.edu.eg

City

-

Orcid

-

Volume

12

Article Issue

1

Related Issue

45360

Issue Date

2024-01-01

Receive Date

2023-08-02

Publish Date

2024-01-01

Page Start

47

Page End

79

Online ISSN

2314-6699

Link

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/article_334829.html

Detail API

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/service?article_code=334829

Order

334,829

Type

Research in linguistic and literary studies

Type Code

2,266

Publication Type

Journal

Publication Title

Egyptian Journal of Linguistics and Translation

Publication Link

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/

MainTitle

The ‘Not-Said’ Versus the ‘Wish-Fulfillment’: A Study of Mahmoud Diab’s Al-Halafit

Details

Type

Article

Created At

28 Dec 2024