Description
“The landlord and the tenant and the relationship between them… the houses and their amenities, the market and its activity, the banquets and their ceremonies, the bathhouse and its patrons, the barber and his printing… all these images of social life as depicted in ancient Arabic literature appealed to me, along with the characters and personalities I found most compelling, alongside the character of ‘Ash’ab’… that observer of meals and food as an astronomer observes the planets and stars… and I testify that I have never seen in any literature a more accurate portrayal of a parasite than his… so I followed his trail and sought out his stories, and began collecting his anecdotes from the books of the ancients… and I mixed them, blended them, and cooked them up… as I put it in the introduction to the first edition… for I said then: ‘Since we are discussing the stomach’—meaning Ash’ab’s stomach—let me show people how I cooked this genre of literature for them. I brought the meat, the herbs, the spices, and the seasonings from the shops of four famous figures: Al-Jahiz and Ibn Abd Rabbih.” And Al-Khatib Al-Baghdadi and Badi’ Al-Zaman. I was truly amazed and my mouth watered at the delights and witticisms I found in their wares. However, I found all of this scattered and disorganized, like salt mixed with sugar. I also found most of these items commonplace, repeated verbatim and in detail by all four, each displaying them in the same way in their respective shops. So I filled my hands with the choicest delicacies and took them to my artistic “kitchen,” where I blended and mixed them into a single “dough,” from which I crafted this interconnected story…
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