Content area
Full text
Beauty in Arabic Culture, by Doris Behrens-- Abouseif. Princeton. NJ: Markus Wiener Publishers, 1999. Princeton Series on the Middle East. 185 pages. Notes to p. 196. Bibl. and Notes to p. 207. Index to p.219. 26 Black-and-white photographs. $49.95 cloth; $22.95 paper.
The topic defined by the author's title is straightforward, but the approach to her subject is oblique. For although beauty, in the pre-modern Arab world, was enjoyed and promoted almost everywhere and at all times, Islam does not possess a general theory on aesthetics (i.e., art and beauty) or a systematic theory of the arts. The author therefore had to search for her evidence in written statements from a wide variety of sources, such as the Qur'an, legal, religious and Sufi texts, chronicles, biographies, belles-lettres, literary criticism and scientific, geographic and philosophical literature. The result is a compendium of references to beauty in chapters on The Religious Approach; Secular Beauty and Love; Music and Belles Lettres; and The Visual Arts (the longest chapter, almost half the book).
This approach is informative and provocative. For the generalist, it provides general comparative material for an understanding of the early Arab cultural context. For the specialist, it raises questions of sponsorship...