Religious Perspectives in Modern Muslim and Jewish Literatures

This book brings together fascinating discussions of the way in which Muslim and Jewish beliefs and practices are represented in modern literary texts of poetry, fiction and drama.
The chapters collected here consider elements of the expression of Judaism and Islam in modern literature. Key topics such as religious ideas and teachings, aspects of mysticism, the tenets of religion, uses made of sacred texts, religion and popular culture and reflections of religious controversies are covered. While there is an embodied comparative element to the chapters, the essays are not confined by comparisons and cover a wide range of the literary expression of religious issues.
With contributions from a group of international scholars, all of whom are experts in the field and each of whom has brought a particular perspective to the topic, this book is a significant contribution to, and will stimulate further research on, the various literatures treated, reflection on comparative work on these two cultural traditions, and new interest in literary expressions of religion and religiousness in general."

Thiscollection brings together discussions of the way in which Muslim and Jewish beliefs and practices are represented in modern literary texts of poetry, fiction and drama. The chapters collected here consider elements of the expression of Judaism and Islam in modern literature. Key topics such as religious ideas and teachings, aspects of mysticism, the tenets of religion, uses made of sacred texts, religion and popular culture and reflections of religious controversies are covered. While there is an embodied comparative element to the chapters, the essays are not confined by comparisons and cover a wide range of the literary expression of religious issues.

1. Urdu Poetry as a Vehicle for Islamic Re-Expression 2. 'Bless each day that passes': The Search for Religious Faith in the Poetry of Ittamar Yaoz-Kest 3. Paths to God Within the Poet: Necip Fazil Kisakürek and his Mystical Poetry 4. 'Merciful Father Abraham: The Mystical Poetry of Benjamin Shvili 5. Moral Education through Islamic Songs in Twentieth-Century Java 6. 'Together with the shell, they have thrown away the kernel': Aharon Halle Wolfssohn's Critique of Judaism 7. The Uzbek Short Story Writer Fitrat's Adaptation of Religious Traditions 8. Kulturkampf in the Israeli Theatre: The Issue of Religion 9. Religion in Contemporary Persian Prose 10. Martyrdom and Gender in American Jewish Culture 11. A 'Cinderella' Goes to Hausaland: Islam, Gender and Hausa Literature 12. Rachel Morpurgo in the Context of Jewish Emancipation in Italy 13. Modern Arabic Literature and the Qur'an: Inimitability, Creatvity,...Incompatibility 14. Avraham Goldfaden's Theatre of Jewishness: Three Prooftexts 15. Transcending the Boundaries of Islam: Writtten Swahili Literature in the Twentieth Century 16. Between Eros and Dios: Leopoldo Azancot's Novia Judia

Glenda Abramson was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, educated in Israel and received her PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. From 1981 she has been teaching at the Oriental Faculty of the University of Oxford and at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies. Hilary Kilpatrick studied Arabic at Oxford. She has taught Arabic literature at universities in Scotland, the Netherlands and Switzerland. She is one of the editors of the journal Middle Eastern Literatures and has published on modern Arabic fiction and classical Arabic belles-lettres, including Making the Great Book of Songs (RoutledgeCurzon, 2003).