A TEAR AND A SMILE  (Hardcover, Kahlil Gibran)

"""A tear to unite me with those of broken heart; A smile to be a sign of my joy in existence."" A book of poetry by Khalil Gibran that touches every soul. Kahlil Gibran was a Lehanese-American writer, poet and visual artist, also considered a philosopher although he himself rejected the title. Gibran disctased ""such themes as religion, justice, free will, science, love, happiness, the soul, the body, and deach"" in his writings, which were ""characterized by innovation breaking with forms of the past, by symbolism. an ondying love for his native land, and a sentimental, melancholic yet ollten onstorical style."" About his language in general (horm in Arabic and Pinglish), Salma Khadra Jayyusi remarks that ""because of the spiritual and universal aspect of his general themes, he seems to have chosen a vocabulary less idiomatic than would normally have been chosen by a modern poet conscious of modemism in language."" According to Jean Gibran and Kahlil G. Gibran, ""Ignoring mach of the traditional vocabulary and form of classical Arabic, he began to develop a style which reflected the ordinary language he had heard as a child in Besharri and to which he was still exposed in the South End of Boston). This use of the colloquial was more a product of his isolation than of a specific intent, but it appealed to thousands of Arab immigrants, "