Street-Arabs, Satire, and the Status of Poetry

The article provides an analysis of the changing status of Arabic poetry. It will be shown that after the great conquests of early Islamic times, Classical Arabic poetry was never truly popular, in the sense of known to and appreciated by all layers of society, except for the odd line or short epigram, usually of the jesting kind, which had a low status. This conclusion may serve to counterbalance overenthusiastic statements on the importance of poetry for the Arabs.