Since literature with its different genres is one of the manifestations of culture and criticism is another, moreover, given that the critical approach is a philosophical process and criticism is a work independent from the creative work, it follows that comprehensive and conscious reading leads to the confluence of the two seas. Hence, the book opens with an introduction presenting a theoretical perspective of the process of criticism. The six chapters that follow come as an application of this perspective through a number of critical studies namely: Freedom and Obligation in the Treatise on al-Basā’ir fī al-Masā’ir (Insights into Destinies); Interpretations of Šath al-Madina; Night Dialogues about the Novel Hātif al-Maghīb- ‘Caller at Sunset’ by Jamal al-Ghitani; The Philosophical Novel, Selection from/ on Alexandria; Time Dialectic, An Introduction to Ghīlān al-Damašqiy, a play by Mahdi Bundoq; and Contemporary Sufi Poetry: Models of Imam Abul Aza’im and Ahmad al-Shahawi.

Number of Pages: 157.

al-Dār al-Masriyya al-Lubnaniyya, Cairo/ Beirut, 1997.