The Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies
And
The Margaret Weyerhaeuser Jewett Chair of Arabic
American University of Beirut
Cordially invite you to two lectures
By
Professor Michael Cooperson
UCLA
The Empirical Strikes Back: Zuhd and Mujun Revisited
A consideration--inspired by Qudamah ibn Ja`far--of the conflict between poetry and reality,
exemplified by Abu l-Atahiyah and Abu Nuwas, the two iconic poets of the early Abbasid period. The
paper addresses the relationship of each figure to the tradition (zuhd and mujun respectively) he
supposedly represents, as well as the ways in which poetry has been used to serve the needs of
cultural history.
December 13, 2013 at 5:00 pm
Auditorium C, West Hall
Jurji Zaydan and the Televised Abbasids
A consideration of the ways in which the early Abbasid period is represented in modern Arabic
historical television series. The paper explores the role of Jurji Zaydan in creating a discourse of
historical fiction in Arabic and how that discourse has been adapted and transformed by television. It
also suggests comparisons with the treatment of historical time in Persian, Turkish, and Maltese TV
productions.
December 16, 2013 at 4:00 pm
Auditorium B, West Hall
Biography:
Michael Cooperson (PhD Harvard 1994) has taught Arabic language and literature at UCLA since 1995.
He has also taught at Dartmouth College, Stanford University, and the Middlebury School of Arabic. His
research interests include the cultural history of the early Abbasid caliphate, Maltese language and
culture, and historical and time-travel fiction. His publications include Classical Arabic Biography, a
study of four ninth-century celebrities and how they have been remembered; and Al Maʾmūn, a
biography of the caliph. He is a co-author, with the RRAALL group, of Interpreting the Self:
Autobiography in the Arabic Literary Tradition; and co-editor, with Shawkat Toorawa, of The Dictionary
of Literary Biography: Arabic Literary Culture, 500-925. He has translated the work of Abdel Fattah
Kilito, Khairy Shalabi, and Jurji Zaidan, and is currently translating Ibn al-Jawzī's life of Ibn Ḥanbal for
the Library of Arabic Literature.