The Fourth Conference on Arab Studies

• During the last five days of this past April the Fourth Conference on Arab Studies was held at the American University of Beirut, presided over this year by Dr. Nicola Ziadeh. Lectures were given, in the order set down in the program, by each of the following:

1 — Mr. Mikhail Naimy, on: The Nature of Literature.

2 — Mr. Mahmoud Taymur, on: The Story in Modern Arabic Literature.

3 — Mr. Ibrahim al-Urayyid, on: Modern Arabic Poetry and Its Cause.

4 — Dr. Jibrail Jabbur, on: Arabic Criticism.

A great throng was observed at these lectures, and a surpassing enthusiasm in the discussion circles, which were confined to the members of the conference. It is thus fair to say that these conferences — which aim at raising the questions of thought on a broad scale among the people of letters and of thought, at the hands of men of specialization and wide experience — have become an event awaited every year at this season, when the company gathers, and the circles of writers, after their necklace has come unstrung and they have scattered to their various occupations, turn to the exchange of views and the debating of theories; and understanding spreads among the writers of Arabic everywhere, that they may know their true condition, take stock of where we stand, whether straight or crooked, and prescribe the remedy if possible...

We congratulate the American University of Beirut on the brilliant success achieved by the Conference on Arab Studies.