Foreign Sources in Children's Poetry by Muhammad Uthman Jalal

This research examines the experience of the poet Muhammad Uthman Jalal in children’s literature, an experience that deserves close attention given the significant impact it had on the course of modern Arabic literature. Jalal offered a pioneering contribution through his famous collection “Al-ʿUyūn al-Yawāqiẓ fī al-Amthāl wa al-Mawāʿiẓ” (The Vigilant Eyes in Proverbs and Sermons), in which he drew on the fables of Aesop and La Fontaine. However, he did not resort to rigid literal translation; rather, he reformulated them in eloquent poetic language and an attractive artistic style that suited the culture of the Arab child and the spirit of the Egyptian environment. Through this creative adaptation, he was able to preserve the educational and moral essence of these fables, while presenting them in an Arab-Islamic form that made them more relatable and acceptable to the young reader.This collection is considered one of the earliest contributions that paved the way for the rise of children’s literature in modern Arabic letters, at a time when systematic attention to this field was still rare. Jalal realized that the Arab child needed a literature tailored specifically for him—one that could meet his educational, aesthetic, and linguistic needs simultaneously. To achieve this, he employed poetry as a medium for both instruction and upbringing. By casting the tales in rhythmic, metrical verse, he made them more accessible to the child’s mind and easier to memorize and recite, in harmony with the emotional and auditory nature of childhood learning،Muhammad Uthman Jalal’s contribution thus marked a qualitative addition to Arabic literature—not only by transmitting these universal fables into a local Arab context, but also by transforming them into an educational resource suitable for schools. His hope was that children would gain a rich linguistic repertoire through the language of poetry, along with intellectual and moral insights through the wisdom and lessons embedded in these poems. This project also reveals an early awareness of the importance of children’s literature as a fundamental pillar of culture, one that is no less valuable than literature intended for adults.Accordingly, this research will seek to shed light on Jalal’s pioneering experience by relying on the comparative historical method