The Arab Studies Conference

Today we write of the "Arab Studies Conference," whose time has passed but whose pleasure and benefit have not; we are still living the rich intellectual life awakened by the men of the conference — lecturers, commentators, and listeners...

It is true that the main subject of study was "The Mission of the University in the Arab World," but the questions that branched off from this subject are enough to keep us living this intellectual life until the date of the next Arab Studies Conference comes round.. Perhaps the most important event, and the one we had long awaited.. was hearing Dr. Taha Hussein at close range.. this wondrous man who rises above glory.. in whom creative thought is embodied, and feeling tinted with the loveliest of colors.. Dr. Taha Hussein's lecture was the close of the conference. It had been opened by Mr. Kamil Ayyad with a lecture on the nature of the university, after the conference was introduced by Dr. Nabih Faris, who counted up the number of lectures delivered in Beirut in the course of this year and found that they came to three and seven-tenths lectures a day — a record figure for a small city like Beirut. He proposed that this year be named the Year of Lectures!

On the second day the first lecture was discussed; then came the time to hear the lecture of Mr. Fuad Efrem Boustani on the origin of the university and its development in the Arab world — the lecture of which Dr. Taha Hussein remarked, "I came out of it with many things in my mind that I had not known.." The third lecture was Dr. Nicola Ziadeh's, on the influence of the university in the Arab world, and it was the one that stirred up a great deal of comment.

Dr. Taha Hussein's lecture was a festival at which everyone who renews thought and feeling came together.. Had there been room, all Beirut would have crept to the American University of Beirut — inside, outside, on the walls.. at the windows, standing, sitting, eyes gazing and ears listening hungrily.

And so the Arab Studies Conference ended. Its time has passed, but its pleasure and its benefit have not..