Literature and Dual Reading

Language to literature is like greenery to a wood. It is the chief means of literary exposition, the medium in which interactive ideas flourish, and the roaming dreams rest. It is such an organic relationship that it is impossible to separate one from the other. Language of literature, to a literary critic, is a large spectrum of concepts, ideas, emotions, and excitement fused altogether within the force of motive that works in the mind of the author at the moment of artistic creation so that it would appear in a form that evokes feeling and calls for various interpretations on the part of the reader. Language to the author is the way by which s/he conveys him- or herself to those awaiting the moment of enunciation, i.e. the moment of the revelation of the literary work. However, it is a carefully selected way of expression. According to Chapman (1973:4), "Literary language has been chosen and manipulated by its user with great care and complexity than the average language user either can or wishes to exercise". The interaction of language and literature, as Pei (1972:138) states, "is a question that has long agitated linguists, causing them to divide into two more or less well-defined camps. Should language be viewed primarily as a speaking activity, and the written, literary language be considered ancillary to speech?" Clearly, this applies to one type of literature, i.e. the written one. What about the oral one of which early Arabic literature is the best example