How the Qur'an Works Reading Sacred Narrative

The Qur'an is a text of extraordinary depth and complexity. In How the Qur'an Works, Leyla Ozgur Alhassen takes the reader on a journey through the Qur'an, moving from one verse to another, one story to another, focusing on narratological elements while conducting a close reading in order to understand particular Qur'anic stories and to show how the text's literary techniques enhance its theological agenda. She unpacks the text by focusing on Qur'anic narrative, and specifically, repetition in Qur'anic stories. Repetition is an important part of the Qur'an's literary technique. Ozgur Alhassen traces the use of repetition as a narrative device from the text's overall structure to individual letters. She compares different Qur'anic stories and explores the kinds of repetition that occur in them and what purposes they serve. Repetition, she shows, forges patterns, connections, and layers of meaning that develop, complicate, and comment on the Qur'an's messages.

Leyla Ozgur Alhassen is a Qur'anic studies scholar and the author of Qur'anic Stories: God, Revelation and the Audience. Her scholarship revolves around Qur'anic stories, style and interpretation in literature, performance, and art, across historical periods, languages, and disciplinary boundaries. She has a PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles, in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures.