Syria

This chapter examines the origins of the novel genre in Syria. Approximately eighteen novels by “Syrians” were published between 1865 and the 1930s, but only a limited number would have a significant influence in subsequent decades. In the 1930s, literary histories described an emerging “new generation” and the beginnings of a modern literary movement in the novel and the short story, and during the 1950s the practice of novel writing took on a truly meaningful proportion in Syria. This chapter also considers the role played by women writers and women’s issues in the development of the Syrian novel, works that showed tendencies of romanticism and social realism, contemporary historical novels, and the emergence of experimental novels and new narrative modes dealing with the Syrian experience.