Cairo, Adab 105).” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 61, no. 4 (1971): 1–81.
Margoliouth, D. S., and Charles Pellat. “Al-Ḥarīrī.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Leiden: Brill, 1960–2007.
Malti-Douglas, Fedwa. “Maqāmāt and Adab: ‘Al-Maqāmah al-Maḍīriyya’ of al-Hamadhānī.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 105, no. 2 (1985): 247–58.
Mathews, Harry, and Alastair Brotchie. Oulipo Compendium. London: Atlas, 2005.
Matthew, H. C. G. “Chenery, Thomas.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/5215.
Micallef, Bernard. “The Essential Achille Mizzi, selected, translated, and introduced by Peter Serracino Inglott. A case for performative translation.” Symposia Melitensia 7 (2011): 129–35.
Mokhtarian, Bahar. “Die Maqāmen des Ḥarīrī in tabarischer Übersetzung (I–VII) nach einer Teheraner Handschrift (Bibliothek Malek, ms. 2487).” PhD diss., University of Tübingen, 2004.
Neuwirth, Angelika. “Adab Standing Trial—Whose Norms Should Rule Society? The Case of al-Ḥarīrī’s al-Maqāmah al-Ramliyah.” In Myths, Historical Archetypes, and Symbolic Figures in Arabic Literature: Towards a New Hermeneutic Approach, edited by Angelika Neuwirth et al., 205–24. Beirut: Steiner, 1999.
Perec, Georges. La disparition. Paris: Denoël, 1969.
Pollock, Sheldon. Language of the Gods: Sanskrit, Culture and Power in Premodern India. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006.
Pomerantz, Maurice A., and Bilal Orfali. “Three Maqāmāt Attributed to Badīʿ al-Zamān al-Hamadhānī.” Journal of Abbasid Studies 2 (2015): 38–60.
Prendergast, W. J. The Maqámát of Badíʿ al-Zamán al-Hamadhání. London: Luzac, 1915.
[Proclus]. Procli Archiepiscopi Constantinopolitani Opera omnia. Edited by J. P. Migne. Paris: Migne, 1864.
Ravāqī, ʿAlī. Maghāmāt-e Ḥariri, Tarjumeh-ye Fārsī. N.p.: Moʾassaseh-ye Farhangi-ye Shahīd Moḥammad-e Ravāghī, 1365 [= 1987?].
Renan, Ernest. “Les Séances de Hariri.” In Essais de morale et de critique, 287–302. Paris: Michel Lévy, 1859.
Rowson, Everett K. “Religion and Politics in the Career of Badīʿ al-Zamān al-Hamadhānī.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 107 (1987): 653–73.
Rückert, Friedrich. Die Verwandlungen des Abu Seid von Serug, oder die Makamen des Hariri. 4th ed. Stuttgart: Cottaschen, 1864.
Sadan, Joseph. “Un intellectuel juif au confluent de deux cultures: Yehūda al-Ḥarīzī et sa biographie arabe.” In Judios y musulmanes en al-Andalus y el Magreb: contactos intelectuales, edited by Maribel Fierro, 105–51. Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 2002.
[Shakespeare, William]. The Norton Shakespeare. Edited by Stephen Greenblatt et al. New York: Norton, 2016.
Steiner, George. After Babel: Aspects of Language and Translation. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Stewart, Devin J. “The Maqāma.” In Arabic Literature in the Post-Classical Period, edited by Roger Allen and D. S. Richards, 145–58. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
. “Classical Arabic Maqāmāt and the Picaresque Novel.” In Classical Narratives, edited by Salma Jayyusi. Forthcoming.
Tolmacheva, Marina A. “Professor Dr. Anna Arkadievna Iskoz-Dolinina.” http://networks.h-net.org/node/8330/discussions/180461/professor-dr-anna-arkadievna-iskoz-dolinina-1923-2017.
Ward, Benedicta. The Sayings of the Desert Fathers. Rev. ed. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1984.
Yāqūt al-Ḥamawī. Muʿjam al-udabāʾ. Edited by Iḥsān ʿAbbās. Beirut: Dār al-Gharb al-Islāmī, 1993.
Zakharia, Katia. Abū Zayd al-Sarūǧī, imposteur et mystique: Relire les Maqāmāt d’al-Ḥarīrī. Damascus: Institut français d’études arabes de Damas, 2000.
. “Norme et fiction dans la genèse des Maqāmāt d’al-Ḥarīrī.” Bulletin d’études orientales 46 (1994): 217–31.
For R. and R.
Κι ἂν εἶσαι στὸ σκαλὶ τὸ πρῶτο, πρέπει
νἆσαι ὑπερήφανος κι εὐτυχισμένος.
Ἐδῶ ποῦ ἔφθασες, λίγο δὲν εἶναι·
τόσο ποῦ ἔκαμες, μεγάλη δόξα.
The Author’s Introduction
In this short Introduction, al-Ḥarīrī confides to God his fear of being so carried away by his own rhetoric that he strays from the truth. He claims to have written the Impostures under duress, though his protests are not very convincing. He also insists that his efforts, painstaking though they are, can only be an echo of the original Impostures, those of al-Hamadhānī. Finally, he defends the practice of inventing characters and speeches in order to make a point. To convey a sense of the balanced, rhythmic character of al-Ḥarīrī’s Arabic, the English Introduction imitates the style of Edward Gibbon (d. 1794), whose Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire uses a variety of rhetorical devices to achieve a stately momentum.
0.1In the name of the most merciful God
Lord, let my gratitude to thee insure the renewal of thy bounty.
Thou hast imparted to us the art of declamation, and instilled in us the power of discernment. Grateful for thy gifts, and safe beneath thy shield, I offer thee the tribute of thanksgiving. From intemperance, as from bombast, guard my tongue; let no defect in speech, or sudden fit of stammering, make me ridiculous. May flattery not inspire, nor indulgence nourish, an unbecoming pride. Be thou my bulwark against hostile and contumacious spirits! Forgive me for kindling those passions that lead, by insensible degrees, to profligacy and vice; and for directing the reader’s steps toward the precipice of sin. Bestow, rather, maturity of judgment, and a disposition to yield to the just demands of truth. Suffer me to speak with an honest voice. Let a firm resolve check the arrogance, and temper the excesses, of self-love. Guide me gently to a more perfect understanding, supply my want of eloquence, and defend me from error in the quoting of authorities. Curb my levity, lest it assume the character of insolence. Suffer me not to reap the bitter harvest of loquacity, or yield to the blandishments of pomposity and affectation. Let me have no reason to feel the lashings of remorse; let me furnish no pretext for censure or reproach; and let me not excite, by some thoughtless ejaculation, the reader’s just reproof.
0.2Admit, Lord, my petition; grant my wish; admit me to thy sanctuary; suffer me not to be consumed. In fervent supplication, I implore thy boundless mercy. If humility avails, behold my abject plea; if an offering must be made, I have nothing to offer but hope. I entreat thee also in the name of Mahomet, our lord and intercessor, the seal of the prophets, whom thou hast raised to the loftiest heights of heaven, and exempted from the penalty of sin. Of him a passage of the Koran, the most credible of witnesses, declares: “These are the words of an honourable messenger, endued with strength, of established dignity in the sight of the possessor
