Riflessioni sull'uso dell'arabo parlato nella letteratura teatrale egiziana del primo novecento

Abstract

The aim of this study is the analysis of the relationship between literary Arabic (al-lugha al-fushâ) and colloquial Arabic (al-lugha al-‛âmmiyya) in modern Arabic drama. The presence of colloquial oral language (al-lugha al-‛âmmiyya) in written texts is underlined by the evidence of particular features connected with different historical periods, between the 19th and the 20th centuries. Towards the middle of the 20th century, Arabic literary criticism had already created some theories on the subject of a modernization in classical Arabic language in the direction of a more simple linguistic code, applied to literary texts and particularly to realistic dialogues: as regards the fi eld of theatrical literature, this article studies some theories and practices by two important dramatists of the period, the Egyptians Tawfîq al-Hakîm and Mahmûd Taymûr.