The Islamic Context of The Thousand and One Nights

Muhsin J. al-Musawi

May, 2009
Cloth, 352 pages,
ISBN: 978-0-231-14634-0
$45.00 / £31.00

"The Islamic Context of The Thousand and One Nights is truly remarkable for the way in which the tales' many aspects are shown to be a reflection of the mores of the centuries within which the different tales and tale-traditions were gathered together. It is also written by Muhsin J. al-Musawi, a scholar who enjoys a worldwide reputation in this field." — Roger Allen, University of Pennsylvania

"This impressive volume argues for the central but missed importance of Islam in the understanding of The Thousand and One Nights. Muhsin J. al-Musawi has devoted much of his distinguished career to explicating, framing, and situating this enduring story of storytelling as an instrument of survival. Here he turns the lens on the religious dimension of this canonical text to provide the latest key piece in the solving of the puzzle." — Miriam Cooke, Duke University, and author of Dissident Syria: Making Oppositional Arts Official

"Muhsin J. Al-Musawi brings to his book an encyclopedic mastery of Arabo-Islamic literary and cultural history, opening up the work to a wider range of discursive elements. To the best of my knowledge, there is no study, short or long, that treats this magnificent literary corpus from this perspective." — William Granara, Harvard University

Related Subjects

• Islam
• Middle Eastern Literature

About the Author

Muhsin J. al-Musawi is professor of Arabic and comparative studies at Columbia University. He has been teaching at the American University of Sharjah and taught at a number of Universities in North Africa and the Middle East. He has published many books in English and Arabic, including Scheherazade in England; Anglo-Orient; The Postcolonial Arabic Novel; Arabic Poetry: Trajectories of Modernity and Tradition; Reading Iraq: Culture and Power in Conflict; and Islam in the Street: The Islamic Dynamic in Literary Production, as well as four novels. He is the editor of the Journal of Arabic Literature and the recipient of many awards, including the prestigious Owais Award in literary criticism.

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