Abstract :
Since the early 1970s the United Arab Emirates and the Sultanate of Oman have been
fashioning a modern cultural heritage, including a modern national literature, in an
increasingly globalized world. The rapid transition from traditional life-styles to modern,
industrialized ways of living has made imprints in the region’s literature. We are able to
perceive the beginnings of a modern literature, anchored in a globalized context and
coloured by its Arabic literary predecessors. In some works we are able to identify global
as well as local and traditional elements impinging on the existence of heroes and other
characters. The protagonist may be situated in an environment that would fit into most
global, urban settings. At the same time he or she is confronted with Arabic folktale
imagery, magic and superstitions. In such stories the global and local merges into what
has been defined as magical Gulf realism.
