[AR] Qasidah al-Markab al-Wa'r li 'Isa Alabi Abubakr: Dirasah Tahliliyyah Inziyahiyyah Ramziyyah

Isa Alabi Abubakar's Arabic Poem Titled "Bumpy Surface": A Deviational and Symbolic Analysis

Abstract

The present status of Nigeria, since the fourth republic in 1999 under the democratic government, had become the talk of its citizens who are the victims of all irregularities therein, but such complaints could not be boldly said or addressed due to limited freedom of speech in the country. On this note, many poets like other artistes, remain silent to avoid getting apprehended, while others remain to be over-reacting not to care about the consequence. Arabic scholars are also in the terrain of addressing the national issues arising, especially those that need urgent corrections for the benefits of the citizenry. They used their creativity to fulfill their aspirations, in addition to their staged admonitions and class teachings. Among such scholars and artistes is Isa Alabi Abubakar, who is the best accomplished Arabic poet in Nigeria. He had discussed the adversities in Nigeria via his poems which have gained the attention of many researchers from linguistics and literature, except for some of his works where he adopted styles of deviation and symbolism. Therefore, this paper focuses on deviational and symbolic analysis of his poem titled “Bumpy Surface”. The study employed the descriptive method to illustrate the features of deviation and symbolism in the selected poem. The findings of the study revealed that Isa Alabi Abubakar has played a vital role in his attempt to acquaint his fellow citizens with knowledge of the problems on ground, to enable them look for the way-outs, although via his indirect speech where he used deviation and symbolism tools like simile, metaphor, metonymy, ellipsis and others to qualify the current administration which has made it a law of conviction against any citizen that tries to negatively address Nigeria issues, as such will be considered as hate-speech which attracts fines and jail.