The Ottoman Canon and the Construction of Arabic and Turkish Literatures

Studies the intertwined manner in which Arabic and Turkish literatures took shape as national traditions.

The Ottoman Canon and the Construction of Arabic and Turkish Literatures fleshes out the Ottoman canon’s multilingual character to call for a literary history that can reassess and even move beyond categories that many critics take for granted, such as ‘classical Arabic literature’ and ‘Ottoman literature’. It gives a historically contextualised close reading of works from authors who have been studied as pionneers of Arabic and Turkish literatures, such as Ziya Pasha, Jurji Zaydan, Ma?ruf al-Ru?afi and Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar. The book analyses how these authors prepared the arguments and concepts that shape how we study Arabic and Turkish literatures today as they reassessed the relationship among the Ottoman canon’s linguistic traditions. Furthermore, it examines the Ottoman reception of pre-Ottoman poets, such as Ka?b ibn Zuhayr, hence opening up new research avenues for Arabic literature, Ottoman studies and comparative literature.