The Arabian Epic: Volume 3, Texts
Heroic and Oral Story-telling

The hero cycles of Arabic belong to the literary tradition of The Arabian Nights and can be seen as the popular epics of their civilisation.

M. C. Lyons (Author)

9780521017404, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 17 June 2005

672 pages
24.6 x 17.2 x 3.6 cm, 1.08 kg

The hero cycles of Arabic belong to the literary tradition of The Arabian Nights and can be seen as the popular epics of their civilisation. The Arabian epic covers ten of the main representatives of this genre. Each of these has been developed through the processes of accretive oral story-telling by means of an accumulation of narrative and folklore motifs, many of which belong to what can be seen as a universal tradition. The work is published in three volumes. The first volume introduces the background and the dimensions in which the cycles are set, while the second volume analyses their contents and the literary formulae used in their construction, as well as listing analogues found in other literatures. The epitomes surveyed in the final volume provide non-Arabists with a more immediate insight into the contents of the cycles, drawing attention to their narrative colouring and texture.

Introduction to volume three
1. Kitab Qisat al-Muqaddan 'Ali al-Zaibaq
2. Sirat 'Antar
3. Sirat al-Zahir Baibars
4. Sirat Bani Hilal al-Kubra
5. Taghribat Bani Hilal
6. Sirat Bani Hilal fi Qissat Abi Zaid al-Hilali wa'l-Na'isa wa-Zaid al-'Ajjaj
7. Sirat al-Amira Dhat al-Himma
8. Qissat Firuz Shah b. al-Malik Darab
9. Qissat al-Amir Hamzat al-Pahlawan
10. Sirat Faris al-Yaman al-Malik Saif b. Dhi Yazan
11. Sirat Saif al-Tijan
12. Qissat al-Zir.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB]