Anne Sofie Roald

Lena Jayyusi

a decade of change

Media and political contestation in the contemporary Arab world

Nizār Qabbānī

A unique collection by the Arab world's most renowned poet. In a political age, in which the struggle against external and internal oppression has become central in Arabic poetry, Nizar Qabbani has succeeded in re-establishing the vitality and perennial force of the erotic in human life. Picking up a tradition of Arabic love poetry sixteen centuries old, he has enriched it with the experience of a modern man deeply aware of the changing status of women in contemporary times, and given the most eloquent poetic expression to the imperative of woman's freedom and her right to assume control over her body and emotions. An accomplished master of the erotic, standing among the best love poets of the world, Qabbani has asserted life and joy in the face of chaos and tragedy, paying fervent homage, sustained over five decades, to woman's grace and loveliness. As such he has been able to bring equilibrium and decorum to poetry in crisis, reviving faith in the possibility of happiness and emotional fulfillment. Yet he is also moved to anger by the forces of evil around him, and the opposing poles of exaltation and rage, of agony and ecstasy, describe his unique experiment. A man of his times and of all times, he is by far the most popular poet in the Arab world.

The Erotic and Other Poetry of Nizar Qabbani

On Entering the Sea

Much has been made of the role of various media in the shaping of conflicts and political agendas in today's Arab world. This volume examines this topic with interdisciplinary contributions that range across media studies, anthroplogy, religious studies, and political science and explore both new and older media forms.

A Decade of Change

Media and Political Contestation in the Contemporary Arab World

The military adventures of a king of Yemen as he battles monsters, ghosts and Ethiopian Christians, and his romantic interlude in the City of Maidens. An Arabic folk tale of unknown authorship, written in prose and poetry.

An Arab Folk Epic

The Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan

"A charming and agreeable surprise . . . A welcome gift to Western readers." —Kirkus Reviews "Editor Jayyusi offers a major example of the Arabic folk epics or romances called siras . . . The siras are full of heroic adventures, exotic landscapes, love affairs, friendships, supernatural dangers, magical spells, and great Arab heroes. . . . " —Library Journal "This text should find its place alongside the translations of other epic traditions of the world as a text well suited for use in university courses on the Middle East, world literature, epic, and folklore." —Journal of Arabic Literature This colorful panorama recounts the fantastic tales of a sixth-century Arab king and offers unusual perspectives on gender, religion, race, and ethnicity. Composed between the 13th and 16th centuries and presented here in English for the first time.

On the eve of the British Mandate in 1917, Jerusalem Arab society was rooted, diverse, and connected to other cities, towns, and rural areas in Palestine. Over the course of the three decades of the Mandate, no one could have imagined the radical rupture that Arab Jerusalem, a sophisticated and vibrant city, would face in 1948 with the establishment of the state of Israel. This groundbreaking collection of essays brings together distinguished scholars and writers and follows the history of Jerusalem from the culturally diverse British Mandate period through its transformation into a predominantly Jewish city. Essays detail often unexplored dimensions of the social and political fabric of a city that was rendered increasingly taut and fragile, even as areas of mutual interaction and shared institutions and neighborhoods between Arabs and Jews continued to develop.

Lena Jayyusi

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