Abū Hilāl al-ʿAskarī and His Literary Critical Position

Abū Hilāl al-ʿAskarī (d. 400/1009) was a prominent rhetorician and critic of Arabic literature with a broad understanding of adab and other branches of knowledge in the fourth century AH, as is evident in his diverse books and in the list of his literary output, as stated by Kanazi. In the literary field, Abū Hilāl's fame is based mainly on two of his books, al-Ṣināʿatayn and Dīwān al-maʿānī, in which his literary taste is shown clearly. Dīwān al-maʿānī includes quotations from poetry and prose which, as he argued in the introduction, represent a high level of rhetoric and well-crafted speech. On the other hand, his book al-Ṣināʿatayn, which literally means ‘the two arts’ (prose and poetry), is directed at those who practice the art of writing by showing them how to avoid uncouth language and to produce valuable literature via a set of rules for sophisticated literary works that could be applied to prose and poetry alike. Hence, Dīwān al-maʿānī is essentially an anthology that consists of examples of sophisticated poetry and prose, while al-Ṣināʿatyn is work of rhetoric that discusses rhetorical devises with examples that can be employed in the production of literary works.

However, ʿAbbās argued that al-Ṣināʿatayn did not contribute significantly to literary criticism because Abū Hilāl did not add his own ideas to the works of his predecessors,4 and thus could not be regarded as a great mind, as also stated by Kanazi (as cited in Ashtiany).