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The life and works of Jāḥiẓ
English, French, Arabic (translation)
- GenresIslam
300 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1969
About the author
Al-Jahiz
133 books169 followersAl-Jāḥiẓ (Arabic: عمرو بن بحر الجاحظ)
Because of the caliphs' patronage and his eagerness to establish himself and reach a wider audience, al-Jāḥiẓ stayed in Baghdad (and later Samarra), where he wrote a huge number of his books. The caliph al-Ma'mun wanted al-Jāḥiẓ to teach his children, but then changed his mind when his children were frightened by al-Jāḥiẓ's goggle-eyes. This is said to be the origin of his nickname.
He enjoyed the patronage of al-Fath ibn Khaqan, the bibliophile boon companion of Caliph al-Mutawakkil, but after his murder in December 861 he left Samarra for his native Basra. He died there in late 868, according to one story, when a pile of books from his private library collapsed on him.
Most important books:
*Kitab al-Hayawan (Book of the Animals)
*Kitab al-Bukhala (Book of Misers) also (Avarice & the Avaricious)
*Kitab al-Bayan wa al-Tabyin (The Book of eloquence and demonstration)
*Risalat mufakharat al-sudan 'ala al-bidan (Treatise on Blacks)
Al-Jāḥiẓ returned to Basra with hemiplegia after spending more than fifty years in Baghdad. He died in Basra in the Arabic month of Muharram in AH 255/December 868-January 869 CE. His exact cause of death is not clear, but a popular assumption is that Jahiz died in his private library after one of many large piles of books fell on him, killing him instantly.
Because of the caliphs' patronage and his eagerness to establish himself and reach a wider audience, al-Jāḥiẓ stayed in Baghdad (and later Samarra), where he wrote a huge number of his books. The caliph al-Ma'mun wanted al-Jāḥiẓ to teach his children, but then changed his mind when his children were frightened by al-Jāḥiẓ's goggle-eyes. This is said to be the origin of his nickname.
He enjoyed the patronage of al-Fath ibn Khaqan, the bibliophile boon companion of Caliph al-Mutawakkil, but after his murder in December 861 he left Samarra for his native Basra. He died there in late 868, according to one story, when a pile of books from his private library collapsed on him.
Most important books:
*Kitab al-Hayawan (Book of the Animals)
*Kitab al-Bukhala (Book of Misers) also (Avarice & the Avaricious)
*Kitab al-Bayan wa al-Tabyin (The Book of eloquence and demonstration)
*Risalat mufakharat al-sudan 'ala al-bidan (Treatise on Blacks)
Al-Jāḥiẓ returned to Basra with hemiplegia after spending more than fifty years in Baghdad. He died in Basra in the Arabic month of Muharram in AH 255/December 868-January 869 CE. His exact cause of death is not clear, but a popular assumption is that Jahiz died in his private library after one of many large piles of books fell on him, killing him instantly.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 9, 2014
The University of California Press should get this back in print, and someone should translate The Book of Animals. Jahiz is a wonderful writer and I would love to read more of his work. There are only one or two used copies of this available on line, and priced accordingly. Hopefully you have access to interlibrary loan.
This is actually a translation from the French. The introduction by the original translator is of its time but a little strange even then. Said would say, ‘See!’. (Didn’t do that intentionally, but on marking it I note that apparently there is a lot of alliteration in Arabic literature.)
According to the original translator, Charles Pellat, there is very little Arabic literature worth translating, and it is literally impossible to translate poetry. He is grudging about nearly every good quality of Jahiz’s work. He is homophobic to boot. But then he and D. M. Hawke, the subsequent translator, produce remarkably eloquent versions of these selections from most of Jahiz’s extant books. (Please note that I have very little background in Arabic literature so if anything below isn’t quite right, please correct it in a comment.)
Jahiz was born in Basra and loved the city dearly, but spent time in Baghdad as that was where the patrons were. He earned a living for most of his life from patronage of his books. He lived from about 776 (C.E., or 160 A.H) to 868/9 (255 A.H. Jahiz is credited with making prose a respectable literary mode in a world that had valued poetry for centuries.
These were glory days for Islamic culture. Jahiz was in the Mu’tazalite camp, a rationalist who believed that reason and experience were gifts from God and to be used to the fullest. He also defended the Abbasid regime. He frequently celebrates diversity in man’s taste and gifts, citing how men find agreeable a wide variety of pursuits and roles that lead to harmony in the community. HIs topics range from ‘The Createdness of the Koran’ to 'Eloquence and conciseness’ [Jahiz is still studied on this topic] to ‘Professional illiteracy' to 'Sahl b Harun and his chickens’ to misers to singing slave girls. There isn’t anything he didn’t write about, it seems.
Jahiz reportedly wrote about two hundred books, of which only a fraction survive. Pellat divides them into three thematic areas, and translates selections from several books of each type:
• Semi-political, semi-theological works
• His own particular type of adab
• Traditional adab
Adab is the literary cultural knowledge needed to work in government or pass as a gentleman. Several works of this time are collections essential items culled from a variety of traditional classics. The charm of Jahiz’s adab is that they are Shandy-esque in their meandering from the topic originally posed to one digression after another. Using a good deal of Sterne’s humor and irony along the way. Indeed, since Pellat interposes very brief summaries of the material between his selections, I found myself time after time saying ‘Well, why didn’t you translate that too, or that—that would have been fascinating.’
The following is a long but lovely example of Jahiz’s humanism, frequent use of long lists of causality or examples, and philosophy, culminating in a beautiful question. It is taken from the Book of the Animals.
[translator’s note summarizing what has been omitted in the interval from the previous translated section: Jahiz quotes some verses about eunuchs and some traditions about the castration of animals; and then he reverts to cross-breeds, fabulous beings, and relationships between men and jinns, and recalls the Zoroastrians’ theory of the origins of the universe. He switches abruptly to a lengthy comparison between the dog and the cock, which is interspersed with numerous digression on such topics as the psychology of the she-cat, the she-wolf, the ostrich and even man.]
I would have you know that the well-being of the world, from the beginning to end, depends on the blending of good and evil, the harmful and the beneficial, the vile and the pleasing, lowliness and loftiness, abundance and scarcity. Pure evil would mean the end of creation. Conversely if good were undiluted, the testing required of us would be meaningless and there would be no need to take thought. Without thought, wisdom ceases to exist, and when there is no longer scope for choice, discrimination disappears; there is no certainty in the world, no hesitation, no studying and no science, no finding the path of understanding, no way of overcoming an obstacle or gaining an advantage; discomforts are no longer bearable and pleasure no longer gratifying; there can be no rivalry in eloquence, no vying for promotion, and the joys of success and pride in victory are done away with. There can no longer exist the righteous man, secure in the strength of truth, nor the wrongdoer sunk in the humiliation of his error, nor the convinced man, happy in his certainty, nor the sceptic filled with the weakness of perplexity and the misery of indecision, there is no hope in men’s hearts, and ambitions strive no more within them; and he who has not known ambition knows not despair, while he who knows not despair knows not peace of mind. Then the angels, quintessence of created beings, and men, for whom the prophets and saints are sprung, will all return to the condition of brute beasts, to stupidity and foolishness, to the condition of the heavenly bodies, subjected to preordained courses, which is a stage lower even than that of grazing animals. For who would be content to be the sun, the moon, fire or snow, a tower or a wisp of cloud or even the whole Milky Way, or a measure of water, or a modicum of air?
I was very glad that I had already read Lost Enlightenment: Central Asia's Golden Age from the Arab Conquest to Tamerlane by S Frederick Starr for context. I highly recommend reading that before tackling this one. I also dipped into Robert Irwin’s Night, Horses and the Desert: An Anthology of Classical Arabic Literature for some help with Arabic literary language, names, etc.
This is actually a translation from the French. The introduction by the original translator is of its time but a little strange even then. Said would say, ‘See!’. (Didn’t do that intentionally, but on marking it I note that apparently there is a lot of alliteration in Arabic literature.)
According to the original translator, Charles Pellat, there is very little Arabic literature worth translating, and it is literally impossible to translate poetry. He is grudging about nearly every good quality of Jahiz’s work. He is homophobic to boot. But then he and D. M. Hawke, the subsequent translator, produce remarkably eloquent versions of these selections from most of Jahiz’s extant books. (Please note that I have very little background in Arabic literature so if anything below isn’t quite right, please correct it in a comment.)
Jahiz was born in Basra and loved the city dearly, but spent time in Baghdad as that was where the patrons were. He earned a living for most of his life from patronage of his books. He lived from about 776 (C.E., or 160 A.H) to 868/9 (255 A.H. Jahiz is credited with making prose a respectable literary mode in a world that had valued poetry for centuries.
These were glory days for Islamic culture. Jahiz was in the Mu’tazalite camp, a rationalist who believed that reason and experience were gifts from God and to be used to the fullest. He also defended the Abbasid regime. He frequently celebrates diversity in man’s taste and gifts, citing how men find agreeable a wide variety of pursuits and roles that lead to harmony in the community. HIs topics range from ‘The Createdness of the Koran’ to 'Eloquence and conciseness’ [Jahiz is still studied on this topic] to ‘Professional illiteracy' to 'Sahl b Harun and his chickens’ to misers to singing slave girls. There isn’t anything he didn’t write about, it seems.
Jahiz reportedly wrote about two hundred books, of which only a fraction survive. Pellat divides them into three thematic areas, and translates selections from several books of each type:
• Semi-political, semi-theological works
• His own particular type of adab
• Traditional adab
Adab is the literary cultural knowledge needed to work in government or pass as a gentleman. Several works of this time are collections essential items culled from a variety of traditional classics. The charm of Jahiz’s adab is that they are Shandy-esque in their meandering from the topic originally posed to one digression after another. Using a good deal of Sterne’s humor and irony along the way. Indeed, since Pellat interposes very brief summaries of the material between his selections, I found myself time after time saying ‘Well, why didn’t you translate that too, or that—that would have been fascinating.’
The following is a long but lovely example of Jahiz’s humanism, frequent use of long lists of causality or examples, and philosophy, culminating in a beautiful question. It is taken from the Book of the Animals.
[translator’s note summarizing what has been omitted in the interval from the previous translated section: Jahiz quotes some verses about eunuchs and some traditions about the castration of animals; and then he reverts to cross-breeds, fabulous beings, and relationships between men and jinns, and recalls the Zoroastrians’ theory of the origins of the universe. He switches abruptly to a lengthy comparison between the dog and the cock, which is interspersed with numerous digression on such topics as the psychology of the she-cat, the she-wolf, the ostrich and even man.]
I would have you know that the well-being of the world, from the beginning to end, depends on the blending of good and evil, the harmful and the beneficial, the vile and the pleasing, lowliness and loftiness, abundance and scarcity. Pure evil would mean the end of creation. Conversely if good were undiluted, the testing required of us would be meaningless and there would be no need to take thought. Without thought, wisdom ceases to exist, and when there is no longer scope for choice, discrimination disappears; there is no certainty in the world, no hesitation, no studying and no science, no finding the path of understanding, no way of overcoming an obstacle or gaining an advantage; discomforts are no longer bearable and pleasure no longer gratifying; there can be no rivalry in eloquence, no vying for promotion, and the joys of success and pride in victory are done away with. There can no longer exist the righteous man, secure in the strength of truth, nor the wrongdoer sunk in the humiliation of his error, nor the convinced man, happy in his certainty, nor the sceptic filled with the weakness of perplexity and the misery of indecision, there is no hope in men’s hearts, and ambitions strive no more within them; and he who has not known ambition knows not despair, while he who knows not despair knows not peace of mind. Then the angels, quintessence of created beings, and men, for whom the prophets and saints are sprung, will all return to the condition of brute beasts, to stupidity and foolishness, to the condition of the heavenly bodies, subjected to preordained courses, which is a stage lower even than that of grazing animals. For who would be content to be the sun, the moon, fire or snow, a tower or a wisp of cloud or even the whole Milky Way, or a measure of water, or a modicum of air?
I was very glad that I had already read Lost Enlightenment: Central Asia's Golden Age from the Arab Conquest to Tamerlane by S Frederick Starr for context. I highly recommend reading that before tackling this one. I also dipped into Robert Irwin’s Night, Horses and the Desert: An Anthology of Classical Arabic Literature for some help with Arabic literary language, names, etc.
November 12, 2018
Jahiz made pithy statements. For instance, he wrote, " . . .the yokel brought up on the Sawad of Kufa speaks standard Arabic, his vocabulary is stylish and well chosen and his ideas are lofty and noble; yet by his speech and pronunciation, he is recognizably Nabataean. Similarly, with the Khuasani: it is obvious from his accent that he is a Khurasani. The same is true of the chancery secretaries from al-Ahwaz." Anyone who has done a little digging will know that the Nabateans left little to no written record of their civilization although they were colossal builders. Witness the monuments at Petra.
Case endings in Arabic are very important to flavoring a story. Jahiz writes, "When you hear a story told in Bedouin dialect, take care only to repeat it with the case endings in the original pronunciation. If you alter it and get the endings wrong, or use the pronunciation of Mongrel Arabs or townsmen, you spoil the flavor of the anecdote and miss the point altogether."
Case endings in Arabic are very important to flavoring a story. Jahiz writes, "When you hear a story told in Bedouin dialect, take care only to repeat it with the case endings in the original pronunciation. If you alter it and get the endings wrong, or use the pronunciation of Mongrel Arabs or townsmen, you spoil the flavor of the anecdote and miss the point altogether."
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews