THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF ARABIC LITERATURE

ARABIC LITERATURE IN THE POST-CLASSICAL PERIOD

The sixth and final volume of The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature explores the Arabic literary heritage of the period from the twelfth to the beginning of the nineteenth century. Traditionalists have tended to characterize this period as one of ‘decadence’ and, having done so, to skip over its several centuries in the quest for more immediately interesting material stimulated by the re-encounter with the West from the end of the eighteenth century. Even though it was during this time that one of the most famous Arabic works of all time – A Thousand and One Nights – was created, this has not provoked a wide-ranging investigation of the period’s literature in general, whether elite or popular, and the period in question has continued to be viewed negatively. This volume seeks to rectify the situation. Roger Allen and D. S. Richards bring together some of the most distinguished scholars in the field to record as much as is known about the literary movements and aesthetic trends of this period. The volume is divided into parts with the traditions of poetry and prose covered separately within both their ‘elite’ and ‘popular’ contexts. The last two parts are devoted to drama, its origins and tentative development, and the indigenous tradition of literary criticism. As the only work of its kind in English covering the post-classical period, this book promises to be a unique resource for students and scholars of Arabic literature for many years to come.

Roger Allen is Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He is the author of The Arabic Novel (1982, 1995) and The Arabic Literary Heritage (1998). He currently serves in an editorial capacity for the journal Middle Eastern Literatures and the Arabic Literature Series of the Dictionary of Literary Biography.

D. S. Richards is Emeritus Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford, and University Lecturer in Arabic (retired). His publications include Mamluk Jerusalem (1987) and numerous articles on medieval Islamic history. He is the translator of Ibn Shaddad’s Life of Saladin (2001) and The Annals of the Turks (2002).