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Translated by Melanie Magidow. New York: Penguin Books, 2021. Pp. xxxiv + 167. $16.
Recent years have seen organized efforts to introduce more works of Arabic literature to the English reader through translation. One such institutional effort is that of New York University Abu Dhabi's Library of Arabic Literature (LAL), which has published scores of translations of primary texts of Arabic literature from various genres into English, many for the first time. With the exception of Bruce Fudge's translation of A Hundred and One Nights and P Marcel Kurpershoek's translations of Najdī verse, the works selected for translation in LAL circulated primarily within elite circles, whether of litterateurs, poets, theologians, jurists, or other intellectuals. Given the dearth of high-quality English translations of canonical works of Arabic literature of all genres, this focus on the literary output of the Arabicspeaking intellectual elite is completely understandable. Nevertheless, premodern Arabic speaking societies also had a vibrant culture of popular literature that, with the exception of The Thousand and One Nights, is virtually unknown to English-speaking audiences. It is for that reason that Melanie Magidow's partial translation of the popular epic...