page_title: Safa Khulusi
section_title: Literary history of Ma'ruf al-Rusafi
hierarchical_section_title: Safa Khulusi / Literary history of Ma'ruf al-Rusafi
caption_attribution_description: English: Statue of the Iraqi poet Ma'ruf al-Rusafi
context_page_description: Safa Abdul-Aziz Khulusi was an Iraqi historian, novelist, poet, journalist and broadcaster. He is known for mediating between Arabic- and English-language cultures, and for his scholarship of modern Iraqi literature. He is also remembered for his theories on Arabic grammar, on Shakespeare, as well as his role in Islamic education and his work on the poetry of al-Mutanabbi.
context_section_description: Ma'ruf al-Rusafi was a revolutionary poet and a controversial character who Khulusi held in high regard. Rusafi was born in 1875 in al-Qaraghul, a modest quarter of Baghdad. He studied Arabic literature and theology with the savant Mahmud Shukri al-Alusi (1856–1924). He was invited to Istanbul by ‘The Arab Friends Association’ to edit the Arabic language magazine Sabil al-Rashad (The Path of Reason). According to Khulusi, Rusafi declared his republican revolutionary tenets within earshot of the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II as early as 1898, exclaiming in one of his odes "It is because it is republican, that government can remove the blindness of those who are led astray." Rusafi inveighs against the Ottoman Caliphate. To him the Sublime Porte is a corrupt black-market for preference and promotion. He says "no government that is run by a sacrosanct personage will ever last". Rusafi remained in Istanbul, lecturing at Madrasat al-Wa'izin (School of Preachers) and publishing poems opposing the autocratic Sultan and promoting the concept of a confederation of Muslim states within the Ottoman Empire.
  
  According to Khulusi, Rusafi's political views at that time are captured in his poetry, in particular Fi Salanik (In Salonika), in which he visualises the army's march against the Sultan. Rusafi's association with the Committee of Union and Progress aided his election to the Chamber of Deputies of the Ottoman Empire. It was here that he first met a fellow Arab member of the Ottoman Parliament, Faisal, son of the Sharif of Mecca. 
  In Khulusi's opinion, Rusafi made a series of calculated decisions based on his political beliefs that affected not only the direction of his life but influenced his literary legacy. He attacked the Arab Congress of 1913 for threatening the unity of the Ottoman Empire. He dismissed the Arab Revolt under T. E. Lawrence and satirised Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca when he seceded from the Ottoman thrall in 1916.
  With the defeat of the Ottomans at the end of World War I, Rusafi was compelled to leave Istanbul, travelling first to Damascus and then on to Jerusalem before finally returning to Baghdad. Rusafi was marginalised when Hussein's son Faisal, his former colleague in the Ottoman Parliament, established a government in Syria in 1920. He found sanctuary in Jerusalem where he lectured at the Teachers College, thanks to the intervention of Raghib al-Nashashibi. While in Jerusalem, Rusafi was heavily criticised for failing to use his poetry to resonate Arab nationalist sentiments during the momentous events of 1920 in Syria and Palestine. As a result, Rusafi's academic role in Palestine became untenable. The problem was resolved in 1921 when he received a telegram from Hikmat Sulayman, inviting him to return to Baghdad as editor of a newspaper supporting Talib Pasha al-Naqib's aspiration to become head of a new Iraqi state. By the time Rusafi reached Baghdad, al-Naqib had been arrested at a tea party held by Gertrude Bell and deported to India, paving the way for Faisal, who had lost his throne in Syria, to become the king of Iraq. Rusafi had once again backed the losing side, this time in opposing Britain's plans for Faisal in Iraq.
  Rusafi was never reconciled to the presence of the British in Iraq. When asked by Khulusi about the often quoted line from one of his poems "The British have ambitious designs against your country, which will not end unless you turn Bolshevik" Rusafi replied "The whole poem was composed in a spasm of rage against the British who blindly followed the advice of a pack of fools who did not represent our country. They refused to listen to the advice I offered in 1921 to Gertrude Bell. She was to have passed it on to the Colonial Secretary, Winston Churchill." The poem was written on the occasion of the Cairo Conference in March 1921, which ended with an accord to implement the Sykes–Picot Agreement of 1916. According to Khulusi, Rusafi's advice to the British government was to establish a republic in Iraq under the presidency of Abd Al-Rahman Al-Gillani and the premiership of T
caption: Monument to Ma'ruf al-Rusafi, in the heart of the old town in Baghdad, close to where the poet was born.[38]
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