The Qur’an and the Aesthetics of Premodern Arabic Prose

1. Auflage 2016
ISBN: 978-1-137-59988-9
Verlag: Palgrave Macmillan UK

Buch, Englisch, 306 Seiten, Book, Format (B × H): 148 mm x 210 mm, Gewicht: 549 g

Reihe: Literatures and Cultures of the Islamic World

This book approaches the Qur’an as a primary source for delineating the definition of ugliness, and by extension beauty, and in turn establishing meaningful tools and terms for literary criticism within the discipline of classical Arabic literature (adab). Focusing on the aesthetic dimension of the Qur’an, this methodology opens up new horizons for reading adab by reading the tradition from within the tradition and thereby examining issues of “decontextualisation” and the “untranslatable.” This approach, in turn, invites Comparatists, as well as Arabists, to consider other means and perspectives for approaching adab besides the Bakhtinian carnival. Applying this critical strategy to literary works as diverse as One Thousand and One Nights and The Epistle of Forgiveness, Sarah R. bin Tyeer aims to prove two major points: how Bakhtin’s aesthetics is anachronistic and therefore theoretically inappropriate when applied to certain literary works and how ultimately this literary methodology is sometimes used as a proxy for ungrounded and, sometimes, unfair arguments by other scholars.Foreword by Angelika Neuwirth, Professor of Quranic studies, Freie University, Berlin, Germany.

Zielgruppe

Research

Autoren/Hrsg.

bin Tyeer, Sarah R.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Contents

 

Acknowledgements

Foreword

 

INTRODUCTION                                                                                                                

Part I  The Hermeneutics of the Qur'an for the Arts: Key Terms                                             

Chapter 1 Husn: The Route to a Conceptual Query                                                                                                  

Chapter 2 Qubh and the Way to Hell                                                                        

Chapter 3 Hell and the Aesthetics of qubh                                                                           

Chapter 4 Language: Beautiful Speech/Ugly Speech                                                

 

Part II   Popular Literature: Thousand and One Nights

Chapter 5   The Aesthetics of Reason                                                                                   

Chapter 6 Of Misplacement of Things, People and Decorum                                   

Chapter 7 The Transgression of Reason                                                                                                                                            

Part III Canonical Literature

Chapter 8 Beautifying the Ugly and Uglifying the Beautiful                                   

Chapter 9 The Littérateurs of Hell and Heaven                                                                                

Coda: The Interpretation and Misinterpretation of adab in Modern Scholarship

Über Autor(innen)

Sarah R. bin Tyeer is a Research Associate in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, UK.  Her recent publications include essays in the volumes: Qur’an and Adab: The Shaping of Classical Literary Tradition, The Beloved in Middle East Literature: The Culture of Love and Languishing, and The City in Premodern and Modern Arabic Literature.Foreword by Angelika Neuwirth, Professor of Quranic studies, Freie University, Berlin, Germany.