Literature of the Islamic World?

You mean religious literature?

Non-religious Islamic literature? That's a paradox.

I believe you are talking about literature from the Islamic world though, which can be Arab, Persian, Turkish/Ottoman and a whole lot more. Personally I'd recommend the memoirs of Usama ibn Munqidh, titled Kitab al-I'tibar. He was a 12th century Arab politician, historian and diplomat from Shayzar, and as such had much to say about the relationship between the Crusaders and the Muslims, often with a humurous tone.

Here is an excerpt:

"The Franks are void of all zeal and jealousy. One of them may be walking along with his wife. He meets another man who takes the wife by the hand and steps aside to converse with her while the husband is standing on one side waiting for his wife to conclude the conversation. If she lingers too long for him, he leaves her alone with the conversant and goes away.

Here is an illustration which I myself witnessed:

When I used to visit Nablus, I always took lodging with a man named Mu'izz, whose home was a lodging house for the Muslims. The house had windows which opened to the road, and there stood opposite to it on the other side of the road a house belonging to a Frank who sold wine for the merchants. He would take some wine in a bottle and go around announcing it by shouting, "So and so, the merchant, has just opened a cask full of this wine. He who wants to buy some of it will find it in such and such a place." The Frank's pay for the announcement made would be the wine in that bottle. One day this Frank went home and found a man with his wife in the same bed. He asked him, "What could have made you enter into my wife's room?" The man replied, "I was tired, so I went in to rest." "But how," asked he, "didst thou get into my bed?" The other replied, "I found a bed that was spread, so I slept in it." "But," said be, "my wife was sleeping together with you!" The other replied, "Well, the bed is hers. How could I therefore have prevented her from using her own bed?"

"By the truth of my religion," said the husband, "if thou shouldst do it again, thou and I would have a quarrel." Such was for the Frank the entire expression of his disapproval and the limit of his jealousy. . . ."

Edited by Reginmund - 11-Jul-2008 at 01:09

Hello Kevin

The 1001 nights can give you quite an excellent portrait about life in nearly all Islamic societies because nearly half of the stories describe life from and Iranian perspective and the rest from an Arab, mainly Egyptian, one.

It is interesting to see the two different accounts of the Emperor death. In the Greek and Italian account he is seen dying as a hero but in the Turkish source his death does not seem so heroic.

The Emperors horse slipped as he was attacking a wounded ‘azeb, whereupon the azeb pulled himself together and cut off the Emperors head.

17.     Beg, Tursun. The History of Mehmed the Conqueror, Bibliotheca Islamica, Chicago, 1978 translated by: Halil Inalcik and Rhoads Murphey

I have embellished it but I got my material from Doukas and mostly George Sprantzes

In those last hours of the siege Emperor Constantine Palaeologus XI held, in his right arm of valor, his swords high in defiance of the Turks; who were swarming through the breaches in the cities’ broken walls.

Feeling abandoned and isolated Constantine XI uttered his final words, “Is there no Christian who will take my head?”2 Shortly afterwards, like brave Achilles, who died by the thrust of a Trojan, poison tipped, arrow; Emperor Constantine was cut down by the edge of a Turkish sword. A Turk struck him in the face and wounded him but in turn, like a lion, Constantine struck back. Another mortal blow struck him down; bringing a dramatic end to the life of the last Byzantine Emperor.” Her adversaries have become the master, Her enemies prosper…Her children have gone into captivity before the enemy.” Lamentations 1:53