Myth in the Poetry Collection For Strangers and Exile by Reem Al-Bayati: An Approach in Light of Bakhtin's Dialogic Theory

Bakhtin’s dialogic theory is considered one of the most prominent modern critical contributions to textual analysis. It views literature as a multi-voiced space where discourses interact in that dismantles the dominance of a single voice. This theory highlights linguistic plurality and intellectual conflict, granting the literary work a dynamic character that reflects the diversity of its audience and their varied perspectives. In this context, the present study seeks to uncover the presence of myth in Reem Al-Bayati’s poetry collection For Strangers and Exile, relying a descriptive-analytical approach informed by Bakhtin’s dialogic theory. The study selects textual evidence from the collection, identifying Eastern and Western mythological symbols and examining how they interact with the poet’s voice and her contemporary experience. The findings reveal that Al-Bayati invokes mythological heritage as a means of expressing her existential vision and anxieties. For her, myth serves as a window through which her concerns, thoughts, and inner conflicts flow. referencing mythological figures such as Tammuz, Ishtar, and Enlil, she adds new semantic dimensions that embody themes of rebirth, fertility, conflict, and absence. Western symbols like Tantalus, Actaeon, and Cronus also contribute to broadening the scope of her poetic experience, shifting it from the particular to the universal. The study concludes that the poet’s occasional accumulation of symbols represents an aesthetic choice that portrays the chaos and fragmentation of the present, while simultaneously mirroring the self’s anxiety and confusion. This affirms the dynamic nature of the text and its multiplicity of voices in light of dialogic theory.