Chwalebna przeszłość arabska w obrazach renesansu literatury XIX i XX w.

The Arabic world is proud of its past and grandeur of former times dating to the pre-islam period and the era of the rise of Islam. The article is an attempt to describe the theme of glory in the Arab literature of the renaissance concerning this region from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. During this time a new Arabic literature developed and it included the so-called poetry of traditional current and drama as an innovatory literary form called neoclassicism, which had not previously existed. Both genres referred to the brilliant past of Arabia and the Muslim civilization, encouraging Arabs to embrace its revival. These genres were basing on the motif of majd – ‘glory’, ‘praise’, ‘fame’. The poetry included, first of all, panegyrics and poems expressing a longing for previous glory while neoclassic dramatists presented the same theme with examples of ancient communities, tribal legends and the history of the Arabic-Muslim Caliphate. The article aims to show the literary pictures of Arabic grandeur and glory outlined by the renaissance writers. With reference to the changes in literature, the paper argues that since the 1950s, poetry and drama writers have rejected the concept of a glorious past and criticized the dreadful and inglorious moments in the history of Arab regions.