The life of Muhammad Mahdi al-Jawahiri and the image of women in his poetry

This study aims to examine the life of Muḥammad Mahdī al-Jawāhirī, who is regarded as one of the leading poets of modern Arabic literature, and to analyze how the image of women is represented in his poetry through multiple layers of meaning. Known for his mastery of the classical Arabic poetic tradition, al-Jawāhirī successfully combines this deep-rooted heritage with the intellectual and aesthetic possibilities of modern poetry. Alongside political and social issues, his works devote considerable attention to the inner world of the individual, emotional ruptures, and personal experiences. Within this context, the image of women emerges in his poetry at times as a symbol of love and longing, at other times as an embodiment of motherhood and compassion, and occasionally as a metaphor for the homeland, suffering, and resistance. The subject of this study is the treatment of the image of women in al-Jawāhirī's poetry in terms of form and content, focusing on how female figures are constructed through various representations and how these representations relate to the poet's intellectual world. The corpus of the study consists primarily of poems from specific periods of the poet's literary career. The symbolic uses of the female image constitute the main scope of analysis. Biographical information is addressed only to the extent necessary to illuminate the background of the poems, while a detailed life narrative is deliberately avoided. The primary sources of the research include al-Jawāhirī's published diwans, poetry anthologies, and Arabic academic studies. In addition, secondary studies on modern Arabic poetry and the concept of literary imagery have also been utilized. Adopting a text-centered and thematic analysis method, this study evaluates the poems within their historical, social, and cultural contexts. It seeks to demonstrate that the image of women functions not merely as an aesthetic element but as a multi-layered structure reflecting the poet's social sensitivity, ideological stance, and intellectual depth. This research aims to analyze the transformations in the perception of women in modern Arabic poetry throughout the historical process. The study concludes that al-Jawāhirī's understanding of women broadens the meanings attributed to women in modern Arabic poetry and constitutes a remarkable literary example that reflects the changing perception of women.