Taking as a starting point Arabic poetry's most famous classical poet, a-Mutanabi (d. 354/965), Yaser (Grand Valley State U., Allendale, Michigan) examines the interconnected political,
religious, and ceremonial impact of poetic discourse on the court of the Hamdanids in the 10th and early 11th centuries. Through line-by-line readings of odes by him and three important later
poets: Ibn Hano al-Andalusi (d. 362/973), Tamim al-Mu'izz (d. 374/985), and Ibn Darraj al-Qastalli (d. 421/1030), he discusses the function that odes played in the existence of three competing
Muslim Caliphs in Baghdad, North Africa-Egypt, and Spain in this period. The volume includes an appendix of Arabic text. Distributed in the US by ISBS. Annotation �穢2012 Book News, Inc.,
Portland, OR (booknews.com)
