Sadism in pre-Islamic poetry

Abstract

Academic studies concerned with approaching Pre-Islamic poetry have raised a lot of psychology-related topics, as psychology is by no means inseparably attached and relevant to poetry. Poetry is created by the very innateness of humans in multiple and various ways, and pre-Islamic poetry does remain an open, researchable and renewable source of study. Literature is born by the surrounding environment, one with cruelty and roughness on one hand, and tribalism and continuous wars on the other hand. Such environment has forced male members to act and behave accordingly so they can naturally address and interact with these circumstances. Pre-Islamic literature, therefore, has been rich in various levels with works and literary texts by exotic-charactered poets, some of which were aggressive in nature. Relevant studies had to investigate these qualities and to research how these qualities reflected on in their works.

This is the key reason we are interested in this topic in particular, endeavoring to understand these works as inspired by the poetic lines, the psycho-social connotations implicated. Sadism, hence, has been a researchable area in pre-Islamic poetry. Many relevant poems were sadist in implication. This study is not solely concerned with Sadism as a sensualist connotation, but it also covered other Sadism-related implications. This research introduces the key definitions including Sadism as a terminology and meaning, historical stages, subdivisions, reasons as manifested in certain pre-Islamic poems. The selection of works were not restricted to certain poets, it, however, covered the three known categories of pre-Islamic poetry, for Sadism was not implicated in a given category. The research, finally, concludes some findings, implications, and areas for further research.