The Development of the Sudanese Novel from 1948-2010

This study is a chronological detection for the development of the Sudanese novel from 1948 to 2010 and its different stages. In this study the author depends on Dirdeeri’s (2007) classification of the Sudanese novels into three stages in addition to Khidir’s (2010) point of view about the nineties period; that is by discussing the different characteristics of each period and the famous writers during that period; then the paper ends with a brief description of the style of Sudanese novel.


Introduction
Arts and literature are considered among the most important means that are needed for social change in general and for the change of Sudanese society in particular, which witnesses a kind of change and types of reformation, which in turn need a detailed registration and analysis. Therefore, there is no way for the novel but to be a reflection for the human reality (Abdalmokaram, 2010: 332). The interest in studying the novel is in depth a structural, cultural, and social one. Which is considered by Abobakr (2010) as one of the literary fields, tools, means, and areas that are concerned with cultural activation; which, in turn, is needed in social enlightening and development. The Sudanese novel's discourse is not different-in its output-from any other discourse in the third world with all its great human issues. It continued to be concerned, during all its development stages, with the complexity and relations of the Sudanese situation, besides, the most sensitive social issues (ibid: 335-336).

Background
The beginning of Sudanese novels is affected by the international and Arabic literature in general and by the Egyptian literature, since Sudan is always affected by the Egyptian literary trends. This effect is a result of the human, cultural, social, and civilization ties. This comes in addition to the local Sudanese effect which took place after the forties (Dirdeeri, 2007: 14). Compared with the Egyptian and Lebanon novel the Sudanese novel is relatively new, the very beginning started with the appearance of " Tagog (1948) by Osman M. Hashim ", which is not a typical artistic novel that has all the elements of the novel. It is considered as a heroic folktale that reflects the effect of the national Sudanese environment … this novel is preceded by many theatrical novels. (ibid: 53) Besides, many local elements like folktale, social communities, the different environments (village, town, countryside), mixed with the Egyptian, Arabic, and international waves resulted in the development of the Sudanese novel (ibid: 15). The next step in its writing was a group of writers who adopted the romantic style, by concentrating on the self and the ardent love … this path was developed later and become deeper in the social novels. In spite of, the fact that the novel in Sudan is new, but it witnessed great and important transformations, which deserve recognition and attention. The substantial basis in this change is the exploring of the newness (Sawi, 2010: 34). The narration scene is crowded with numerous novels which adhere the political scene and ISSN: 00333077 5924 www.psychologyandeducation.net highlight the ideology in a clear way … in addition to a group of historical novels; in a parallel direction for the historical novel we find the social novel in a larger notion, reporting the rural view, examining the rural reality and its relation with the town that looks for mixed language attracting attention to the marginal and the neglected (ibid: 35-36). The novelists reflect the village's life and discuss its problems, like health and educational negligence; they criticized the living standards of the villagers live claiming that it is hard and in bad economic circumstances; while some of the writers deal with the ordinary daily life describing the strong social relations (Dirdeeri, 2007: 32). On the other hand, the city novelists describe the social life of the city like marriage problems between the rich and the poor, the town daily life problems and its hard-living conditions, and the anxiousness feelings of life (ibid: 34). They, also, treat political and national issues, the parties' ideological struggle, the national events, educational problems, the students' role, women's social position and problems in the work in addition to women's relation with men. One of the important issues that is treated by the town novelists is the prostitution, which is a city phenomenon that is not found in the village, they portrayed their hard conditions and the pain they undergo because of the look of the society towards them( ibid : 34 -36). So, the Sudanese novelists (from town or village) have described problems of the society and described their feeling towards it in an effective way (ibid: 37). The discussion will not be complete unless one mentions the female novelists. In this direction, one finds that females concentrate on feminism as an ideology that struggles for women's values and position.

Sudanese Novel's Development:
The development of the novel correlates with cultural and social variables in society, and since the relation between literature and society is inseparable, the novel affects by the society and develops with it, whenever the society advances culturally and educationally; novelists find something to write about. Dirdeeri (2007) divides the novel's development into three stages, up to the seventies, in the following way: The First Stage: It is the stage of writing on topics that are affected by national, social, and political motivation, that occurred during the thirties, when novels like "al-Makk Nimir by Ibrahim al-Abadi (1937) which was composed in verse in colloquial Arabic ", "Khraab Soba by Khalid abu-al-Roos (1937)", and " Tajuj wa al-Muhalag by different writers" beside "Tajuj by Osman Mohammed Hashim (1948)" which was considered by some critics the first Arabic novel in Sudanese literature; the novels of this period discuss public topics for national incidents and national heroes. The novels of that period were technically naïve and simple.

The Second Stage:
The novels of this stage, which begin in the fifties, were of social and political nature, concern with life and social problems and present them in a more developed style in presentation and reflection of the problem. They advanced towards the artistic novel in structure and form, which are stable, origins, and develop towards the artistic growth. For example "Haayim ala el-Ard (1954)" by Badwi Abdel-Gadir which is a good example for the novel of this period in imitating the foreign environment; "Hayat el-domou (1963)" by Hindi Awadel-Kareem and the effect of foreign literature is also clear in this novel in which he describes the meeting of two lovers by the river; "Inahom Basher (1960)" by Khalil Abdalla el-Haj which discusses the problem of poor people and how they struggle to gain their living, in which the effect of the novel "Zogag el-Madag" by Najeeb Mahfouz is clear; and "Bidayat el-Rabee (1957)" by Abubaker Khalid which discusses political issues. The majority of the novels during this period were weak in language. They were characterized by long exposition, surprise, the intervention of fate

The Third Stage:
In this stage, the novel steps largely towards being contemporary in the artistic structure, presentation of problems, and discussing of the important issues; in which the social and cultural conditions play a great role, the members of society become more aware nationally and politically, and the social conditions become better than before. The novels of this period began to appear during the second half of the sixties and the beginning of the seventies; which were over possessed by alienation, home-sick, the background, and childhood memories. The novelists of this period were affected by English culture more than Arabic culture. The novels do not get rid of some artistic imperfections in this stage that accompanied the preceding stage … some of the novels are very colloquial , which made it difficult for those novels to cross, not only, the regional boundaries but also to exceed the locality in which it was written. Khidir (2010) adds that the attempts to study the ninety's novel discourse is an attempt to read the cultural discourse in general from an intellectual point of view. He thinks that during this period, the control of the social institutions has decreased. These social institutions are dominant and have central authority on the individuals, beginning with the father's authority at home, chieftain at the tribe … to the transitory authority. This control diminished to a degree that engorged the repressed discourses to rebel against. This resulted not only in the changes that took place internally and externally, but by the collapses in the world that shadowed the internal situation. All these factors lead to the fact that the father/social institution are not the only bodies who issue the discourses or concerned with the establishment of knowledge and power, … but there are other discourses that are carrying its power and consequently the knowledge that it produced … all these resulted in the establishment of new engines for the literary text, new susceptibility for writing, a kind of epistemology, and heterogeneous speech.

The Style of Sudanese Novel:
The directions of the novelists' narrative styles, which began since the middle of the fifties in a slight way and in the sixties in a considerable way, varied between the social romanticism that discussed social problems, national romanticism which dealt with national problems like the struggle against the colonial regime. The novel of that era calls for political awakening; and social realism which paid attention to the different social classes' problems, and reflects its conditions, its positive and negative acts, and the fundamental social issues (Dirdeeri, 2007: 161).

Conclusion
Literature is the mirror that reflect the society and by going through the different stages that literature of any society passed through we can draw a clear picture about that society and this is what the author of this paper tried to do; that is by tracking the different periods of the Sudanese novel, as a part of literature, to understand the different characteristics and features of Sudanese society beside shedding some light on the style of these novels and consequently the society.