Medieval Faculty Colloquium: “Translating Jurjani: Why read an eleventh-century text about Arabic poetics?”

The Program in Medieval Studies is pleased to offer the Faculty Colloquium series for Spring 2023. Lara Harb (Near Eastern Studies) will present this lunchtime talk on Wednesday, April 19.

Last fall, Harb spent the semester translating a work from Arabic entitled The Secrets of Eloquence and teaching it to a group of graduate students. Authored by the eleventh-century literary theorist and grammarian ʿAbd al-Qāhir al-Jurjānī, The Secrets constitutes a pivotal work in the development of classical Arabic literary criticism. In addition, its theories and framework have a wider applicability that Harb contends can and should be part of larger conversations about poetics and aesthetics beyond Arabic. Harb will discuss some of the challenges of translating this work and making it accessible to an English-speaking audience and will attempt to answer the question: why read Jurjani?

Please RSVP for this event here.