I believe that a good writer is, of necessity, a good reader. Talent alone, no matter how high it may be, is incapable of creating such a good writer if he does not continue to acquire knowledge from its various sources, old and new, to draw inspiration from it for what is new. In the face of this huge “momentum” in our cultural life of books, we are often shocked, despite the luster of titles and titles, that those who wrote them are not readers, and let us say they are not good readers, at the very least.
I remember that I heard from the prominent Lebanese critic d. Yumna Al-Eid, in a symposium held in Sharjah in the past nineties, said that “there is no writing that does not start from non-writing.” And it is, as we see, a saying that has the same meaning, meaning that any new writing must start from previous writing. In the sense of its reproduction or repetition, but in the sense of its assimilation to become the birth of a new, different writing, because its author is different, and because his knowledge formation and life experience are different.
In an interview with the prominent Moroccan critic and thinker Abd al-Fattah Kilito, conducted with him, in French, by Amina Ashour, and included in the book “Kilito… Subject to Questions,” which was translated into Arabic by his colleague and compatriot Abd al-Salam Ben Abd al-Aali, Kilito said that one of the students showed him an imaginary work he put together, and when talking With the student, it became clear to Keleto that he had never read a novel, nor a collection of stories, and that he was unable to mention to him even one title of a book he had read. Kilito’s goal was to disapprove of such a matter, so how can someone who aspires to become a writer not have seen other books, and in the same field in which he desires to become a writer, as is the case of this student.
Nietzsche is attributed to saying, “Exaggerated reading is an obstacle,” but Kilito believes, on the other hand, that Nietzsche’s vast readings did not prevent him from becoming what he became, a philosopher immortalized in history.
And as long as we mentioned Abdel Fattah Kilito, there is nothing wrong with giving his answer to a question put to him by the same interlocutor, perhaps it is related to the topic. The question says: “What book will you carry with you to an uninhabited island?” When Kilito asked her in astonishment: “One book?” His answer: Let’s say two. His response was as follows: “Two dictionaries. Arabic and French. Since the combination of words is infinite, I shall be able, perhaps in the isolation of my island, to reconstruct fragments of Arabic literature, fragments of French literature, and fragments of European literature.
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