Tale of al-Barrāq Son of Rawḥān and Laylā the Chaste
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- ISBN 9780197266687
- Weight: 660g
- Dimensions: 164 x 242mm
- Publication Date: 23 Apr 2020
- Publisher: Oxford University Press
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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This book presents a bilingual edition and study of an anonymous work of early Arabic fiction set in pre-Islamic times: an Arab maiden called 'Laylā the Chaste' is kidnapped and threatened with forced marriage to a Persian king. Ultimately, she is saved by her handsome and beloved cousin al-Barrāq, and they marry and live happily ever after. This knight-in-shining-armour-rescues-damsel-in-distress narrative, which combines elements of the Arabic popular epic (sīra) with others from the Udhrī; love story and the western fairy tale, was misinterpreted as history by scholars in the 19th century. In the two substantive chapters that frame her translation of the tale, Hammond discusses the text's evolution in the Arab Renaissance and its metamorphoses in 20th-century popular culture. She also analyses the structure of the tale to look for clues as to its real origins, shedding new light on theories of the development of the Arabic novel.
Marlé Hammond is currently Senior Lecturer in Arabic Popular Literature and Culture at SOAS University of London, where she has taught courses on Arabic literature and Middle Eastern Cinema. Previously she was British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow (2007-2010) and St. John's College Research Centre Fellow (2002-2006) at Oxford University. She was raised in Albany, New York, and studied under Pierre Cachia, George Saliba and Magda Al-Nowaihi at Columbia University in New York City. From June 1990 to June 1991, she was a Center for Arabic Study Abroad Fellow at the American University in Cairo. She now resides in Oxford with her husband and two teenage children.
