The raven and the falcon : youth versus old age in medieval Arabic literature /
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This book fills a long-standing gap in Arabic-Islamic studies. Following the informative and entertaining style of adab literature and based on a large number of relevant sources from a wide range of genres, Hasan Shuraydi presents a panoramic view of relevant themes that concern youth and old age in Medieval Arabic literature intended for both specialists and non-specialists. A pattern of binary oppositions runs through such themes, e.g., black/white, male/female, husband/wife, sacred/profane, paradise/this world, ignorance/wisdom, past/present, young/old, new/old, health/disease, sappy/dry, permitted/forbidden, lust/chastity, obedience/disobedience, experience/inexperience, folly/reason, sobriety/intoxication, parent/child, celibacy/marriage, present life/hereafter. Themes discussed include: aging, ambition, aphrodisiacs, beauty, education, feminist trends, hair dyeing, homosexuality, honoring age, jihad, life stages, longevity, love, marriage, sex.
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1 online resource (pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004278950 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
How do you say "epigram" in Arabic? : literary history at the limits of comparison /
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The qaṣīdah and the qiṭʿah are well known to scholars of classical Arabic literature, but the maqṭūʿ , a form of poetry that emerged in the thirteenth century and soon became ubiquitous, is as obscure today as it was once popular. These poems circulated across the Arabo-Islamic world for some six centuries in speech, letters, inscriptions, and, above all, anthologies. Drawing on more than a hundred unpublished and published works, How Do You Say "Epigram" in Arabic? is the first study of this highly popular and adaptable genre of Arabic poetry. By addressing this lacuna, the book models an alternative comparative literature, one in which the history of Arabic poetry has as much to tell us about epigrams as does Greek.
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1 online resource (337 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004350533 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The performing arts in medieval Islam : shadow play and popular poetry in Ibn Daniyal's Mamluk Cairo /
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This is a study of the life and work of Ibn Dāniyāl (d. 1310), a Cairo-based eye doctor, poet, playwright, court jester, and arguably one of the most controversial cultural figures of his time. Drawing on medieval Arabic sources, many still in manuscript and some used for the first time, the author further contextualizes Ibn Dāniyāl's work with respect to poetry production and popular culture in the Islamic Near East in the post-Mongol period. The book also presents the first full English translation of "The Phantom," one of Ibn Dāniyāl's three shadow plays, the only surviving pre-Ottoman Arabic theatrical texts.
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1 online resource (xiii, 240 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [229]-233) and index. :
9789004218802 :
0929-2403 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.