I've been perusing some of the old Beiruti poetry journals of the 1950s and 60s lately and was struck by the advertisements — and how they seem to suggest a style of modernist, petroleum-centered consumption that might go with modernist poetry. These images are from issues 5-11 (1958-9) of Majallat Shi‘r, edited by Yusuf al-Khal and Adonis, and from issues 1-3 (1962-3) of Majallat Hiwar, edited by Tawfiq Sayigh. (Critical side note: Hiwar was funded by the Congress for Cultural Freedom (later renamed the International Association for Cultural Freedom), a CIA sponsored front-group in the culture battles of the Cold War. The CCF also sponsored political and literary conferences in the region, including the famous 1961 Rome Conference, a landmark event in the formulation of Arab modernist poetics.

Iraq Petroleum Company, Ltd (Shi'r, 1958)

Iraq Petroleum Company, Ltd (Shi'r, 1959)

من أين لك هذا؟